Heavy Duty
by Anotherjaneway
Summary: Old flames clash when things heat up a little too much at Rampart Hospital. Station 51 struggles through a heavy day of duty.


This is a text version of the original still airing imaged, music soundtracked story.

Emergency Theater Live, Episode Twenty Seven

27. Heavy Duty Season Four - Episode 27 Short summary-  
Old flames clash when things heat up a little too much at Rampart Hospital. Station 51 struggles through a heavy day of duty.

****WARNING**** The long summary to come is very story spoiling and will take away plot surprises if you read it now before reading the longer story below it.

Decide now if you want to read this episode's detailed summary before doing so.

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Long Summary-  
Station 51 begins a high angle rescue of two snotty children stuck up a skyscraper and both paramedics get attacked by a pair of peregrines defending a nest. Rampart Hospital suffers an underground laboratory explosion that entraps Dixie McCall under debris. Dixie's current lover,  
Dr. Fred Hathaway, a surgeon, pulls out all the stops to try and skip triage to go look for her. Roy and Johnny, at the hospital on a supply run, rush to begin a locate McCall but another explosion brings part of the parking lot and a truck down on top of all three of them. A burst water pipe complicates matters when the lab basement room begins to flood with rising water.. Gage tries desperately to dig them out after Roy blacks out from a drugged needle stick and nearly drowns. Dixie performs mouth to mouth on DeSoto while Hathaway helps free Roy's pinned ankle. Hathway sacrifices himself to save the others when it becomes a choice of rope lifting Dixie first when the pinning truck breaks free starts to tumble down on top of them.  
Kel helps Dixie deal with her lover's death and Roy teases her goodnaturedly in the hospital cafeteria days afterwards to try and cheer her up.

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The Story Unfolds...

Season Four, Episode Twenty Seven.  
Heavy Duty Debut Launch: November 1st, 2005.

*  
From : katalyia Sent : Tuesday, November 1, 2005 8:58 PM Subject : [EmergencyTheaterLive] Heavy Duty

Roy pulled Squad 51 to a halt, barely aware of the Engine doing the same behind him. He opened the door, and hopped out, knowing without looking that Johnny had beaten him out the door and was grabbing the lines out of the back, as he studied the side of the building. Following his partner's gaze, he wondered how they were going to get up there.

"How did they manage to get themselves stuck up there?" Johnny asked, as he looped the rope over his shoulders. "Do you see where they're at?"

"Yeah," Roy answered, following his pointing finger. "It's not going to be easy to get them down.

"You're right," Johnny responded, glancing back toward the engine and watching as Stanley approached. "What do you think, Cap? Want us to get up there before the snorkel gets here?"

Cap studied the situation for a moment, then answered, "You think you can make it up there?"

"Sure," Johnny answered, after a moment. "We can reach the top if we follow that path and then Roy can lower me down."

"Roy?" Cap asked, glancing at him.

"Sure," Roy answered, not liking the idea.

"What's the problem?" Johnny asked, picking up the slight hesitation.

"I don't like it. If either one of us slips, it's a long way down."

"But do we dare wait?" Johnny asked.

"No, we can't. Not with them that close to the edge."

"Then let's go," Johnny answered, heading off toward the only way up.

Roy sighed, not liking it, but knowing that Johnny was right, and followed him up. It was a rough climb and both of them had a problem at one time or another, to keep from getting stuck themselves. After what seemed like hours, but was only about thirty minutes, they reached the top and looked over the edge.

As Johnny put on his life belt and threaded the safety rope through the loop, Roy studied the area, hoping to find an easier way to reach them. By the time Johnny was ready, he had to accept that there was only one way down, and they were it.

"Ready?" Johnny asked, as he handed the rope to Roy.

"Yeah. You?" Roy shot back.

"Yeah," Johnny answered looking over the side. "I hope they stay put. Hitting the ledge from this angle is going to be hard enough without worrying about landing on them."

"Just be careful," Roy reminded him, bracing himself as Johnny slowly started down the incline.

"I will," Johnny responded, focusing his attention to a spot just to the right of the victims location.

All talking ceased as Johnny concentrated on maneuvering his way down the incline. He was basically climbing blind as he couldn't see more than three feet below him. He had only been working his way down for a few minutes when his left foot slipped out from beneath him and he went down and he hit the side of the incline. He gasped as the tension of the rope tightened around him before easing.

"Johnny!" Roy called down, as the rope went slack again. "Are you all right?"

"Yes!" Johnny called up, remaining prone as he wiped the dirt off his face and spit some from his mouth. "I'm all right!" Then glancing down, he saw he had about a foot to go. "Just another foot or so and I'll be there!"

"Okay! Taking up the slack!"

As soon as the slack was taken up, Johnny carefully brought his feet beneath him and started back down. A few minutes later, he had reached the ledge and looked into the two frightened faces looking up at him.

"Hi! My name's Johnny. What do you say about getting down from here?"

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos: None.

*  
From : Roxy Dee Sent : Thursday, November 3, 2005 1:50 PM Subject : Birds of a feather~~

"We're not going unless they can go, too!" cried the blond haired girl.

Johnny had to blink at that. "Uh,.." he mumbled, looking around and wiping the ample sweat off of his brow with a glove. "Who're they?"

"Them!" said the boy in Gage's arms, pointing. "Right over there.."

"They need us!" insisted his young female friend. "They're hurt. Not us!"

DeSoto rubbed dirt off his exertion runny nose. "Did we miss a head count here, Johnny? I thought the corner cop said that there were only two kids stuck up here."

Roy and Johnny both twisted on their ropes, mindful of snagging, until they eyeballed the side of the building's escarpment cap upon which the stately stone skyscraper gargoyles sat.

Gage came face to face with a nervous peregrine, backframed by the flowing traffic, far below. "Agh!" he shouted, when the bird promptly took to the air and started dive bombing both the firemen paramedics.  
"Would you--!" He bit off his explicative when he realized that an angry bird of prey wasn't all that good on the english language.

Roy ducked, too, and swayed, causing both their anchor ropes to jostle and ripple down the building.

Cap's voice immediately shot out of their belted HTs, its sudden booming immediate voice driving off the oddly furious falcon. ##Engine 51 to Squad 51!  
Are you all right up there?! Do you have a struggle on your hands?##

Johnny fumbled for his talkie, spinning on his line ridiculously, until he planted both feet on the powered down radio antennae that they had just climbed past to still himself. "Affirmative and negative! We just got--" and he broke off, at a loss for words.

Roy, still rotating on his lifeline slowly, got out his own radio and completed the sentence Johnny couldn't finish, neatly. "..shown off by a peregrine falcon. Must be a nest around here somewhere nearby."

##I'm beginning to understand things a little better here. Kids and birds' nests are like powercords and outlets. They're gonna get into them#  
sighed Cap. ##O.k. Do what you have to do while you secure those kids.  
If the air attacks get bad, let us know and we'll send a stream up through the bucket man. 110's snorkel is half way up to you already. It will be extended to meet you as far as it can reach, at the halfway descent point.##

Both paramedics threw their chins down to gape between their hanging feet and saw that it was true.

##Any injuries? Do you want an ambulance?## Hank asked.

"Affirmative, Cap. Looks like the boy here's got a face lac. Let's go through the motions for mom's sake, when you find her." Roy said, starting to seethe at the idea that two children under ten were unattended long enough to get themselves stuck on a ledge sixty storys up a very tall building. "Are you his sister?" he asked the little girl while he roped and lifebelted her in. He had noticed the close resemblance between the two.

"Yeah, I'm Nan and that's Stan, short for Stanley Dean."

Johnny caught onto his irritated mood in kind. "Listen, doesn't being this high up bug you two at all?" he asked the boy while he lifebelted and hooked the child safely snugged to his own.

"Why should it? My sister says you can't fall if you don't move. So why be afraid of it?"

Roy started grinning despite himself but then his fierce disapproval of unshaparoned minors got the best of him. "Does your mother know where you are?"

"Sure she does. She's one of the biologists who's been studying Zoom here." said Stan, accepting the helmet that Johnny put onto his head.  
"She just left a half an hour ago to get us lunch. We didn't mean to fall. Honest. Usually, we're very careful. We just go out to make sure the eggs are staying warm."

"Every day." agreed Nan. "Only today, Stan twisted his ankle and fell down to the ledge. That's how we found out that Zephyr and one of his babies were hurt from a cat that tried to eat them. Zoom's just trying to protect her family. She didn't mean anything.." insisted Nan. "Please, please you gotta get Zephyr and the hurt baby down. That's what we wanted to do in the first place."

Gage started up. "Now listen. We're people paramedics, not peregrine paramedics! And besides, birds' of prey talons are very dangerous if you don't know what're doing. And I'll admit, I don't know what I'm doing even being up here, guys!"

Nan crossed her arms. "You climbed up here because a cop told you to do it. I know how it works. Mom and us, we always get harrassed by them about studying the three confirmed falcon families around town."

Roy's eyebrows went up at that fairly informed answer. It spoke of an intelligence that belied age. "Ok, so you think you were given proper permission to hang on the side of a building just because your mother has a license to? Well, let me share something with you, it's against the law for folks your age."

It was Stan's turn to cross his arms, except for when he had to swat away Johnny's hand for fussing with his small cheek cut with a square piece of gauze. "What law? There's no ordinance against falcon studies."

"Oh, yeah? I'm not talking about urban nature study regulations, I'm talking about reckless child endangerment!" said DeSoto, glaring firmly.

Gage, meanwhile, still had his hands full. " Hold still, Stan. All right. I'll stop monkeying with your laceration until we hit the ground. Lemme see your ankle. Now which one is it?" he said, beginning to spin on the axis of his rope again until the firefighter manning it below muscled in the reverse rotation, to slow and stop the effect.

"The left one."  
"The left one." replied both kids. But then Stan added more. "Don't think my foot's outta commission, buster. Because I'm gonna start doing a whole lotta kicking here, square into your gut, if you don't rescue Zephyr and his son before you two turkeys leave with us on this 'rescue'."

Johnny framed an arm around his middle instinctively. "That wouldn't be the smartest thing to do, now would it?"

"When two lives are on the line?" Nan huffed. "You bet it is. Go get em! Or I'll add biting to his list! But, take me with you when you go to the nest and I promise I'll keep Zoom from taking a chunk out of your scalp."

DeSoto sighed and then signalled to the firemen watching from the bucket snorkel below that he was going to be making a lateral move.  
"Take your sweater off. I'll use that to wrap the tiercel in. You handle the hurt chick. I need both my hands to do the climbing. I'll put him into my helmet and hang it off a jacket snaffle or something. Just stay quiet and unmoving while I'm doing it."

"Thank you, sir." said the little girl politely.

Stan started up. "See, Nan? I guess firemen aren't so bad after all. They actually listen to ya unlike those corner cops we constantly dodge to get up here."

Zoom, the female peregrine, started screaming when her mate and one of her chicks suddenly disappeared from her sight a few minutes later.

But she didn't charge ballastically any more, past the one armor beaked stab she took at Roy's departing shoes as he left the nest site.

Zephyr, the male falcon's head, now kid sweater covered, caused the bird to twitter softly in question and that calmed down much of the flying female's fire directed at the two adult human intruders, after that.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was a long trip down to the snorkel.

Johnny and Roy didn't know exactly what they were going to tell Captain Stanley in explanation when he finally eyeballed the two bleeding birds with them. They unspokenly decided that the problem was beneath notice.

All they cared about was that two more kids hadn't become another set of sad urban fall fatality statistics.

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Photo: Gage hanging from a rope in the sky.

Photo: Roy near a ledge trapped man.

Photo: A peregrine falcon, staring at you, backdropped by traffic.

Photo: A falcon dive bombing from a fire stairwell.

Photo: Roy talking to a kid calmly.

Photo: A falcon attacking someone's escaping shoes.

Photo: Roy reaching for a boy on a ledge on a ladder.

Photo: An Addison ladder and bucket, fully extended vertically.

Photo: That same ladderview, straight down towards the engine.

Photo: Cap, peering upwards, intently, in a helmet.

*  
From: "Cassidy Meyers" Date: Mon Nov 7, 2005 4:35 pm Subject: The AMA girl..

Roy and Johnny were divested of their problem in the form of the children's mother, who strode into their midst wearing a bland, I-expected-this-to-happen-someday,  
matter of fact expression. "Nan?..Stanley?.. ah, there you are. Oh, hi fellas. Excuse me a second and I'll be right with you." She immediately knelt by her son's cot and examined the softly warbling bird in the boy's arms. "Oh, no! Don't tell me,  
the penthouse caretaker's cat?! You poor thing..." she cooed at Zephyr, gently manipulating the falcon's wing out to inspect all the blood tinged pinions. "Stan, he's ok, this doesn't look serious. Just a few nasty skin scratches."

Roy and Johnny exchanged disbelieving looks with each other.  
Then Roy DeSoto cleared a thoroughly climb weary, dusty throat and took a step forward while his partner, Gage, stood by with the bio receiver phone open to Rampart, and muffled against his thigh. He knew that Roy, by far, was the best choice to play the public service diplomat. Johnny tried to content himself with nursing his cramp riddled shoulders and forearms.

"Ma'am?" DeSoto smiled timidly, through the grime on his face.  
"Can we talk a moment? We can't treat the boy here until we do."

The long haired ornithologist finally looked up, a warm grin on her face now completely free of birding worry. "My son can handle getting a few bumps and bruises without fussing or bothering folks unnecessarily. I'm ...pretty sure he must have told you already that his scrapes are nothing by now. He knows enough to tell someone whenever he's really hurt. I can tell he isn't, or he would've shared that with me already, Mr....uh.."

"Mr. DeSoto. Fireman paramedic Roy...DeSoto." he added, still plastered in a mild public smile and pulling on his shirt's name tag.

"Yes, I think I understand the nature of your occupation." the mother said demurely with a winning freckled grin as she hugged her daughter and kissed her head. "Good job getting help for Zephyr and his son, dear. I'll call the vets right away as soon as we're done speaking with these fine firemen." she told Nan as she next held and examined the fluttering white falcon chick. She looked up with the first frown the firemen had yet seen. "Uh,, do either of you have some cotton or a clean cloth handy? I can't see what I'm doing here."

Johnny ran frustrated fingers through his hair and thrust out an already opened and corner taped four by four for her.

"Oh, thank you so much." said the mother and she taped up a bare spot of ripped away down on the tiny bird's back. "There, Nan. Stop fretting. This'll hold well enough to keep him warm until we get to the university lab."  
Then she stood. "I believe, sir, that your station has an against medical advice form that I have the option of signing that'll release you from all of your legal responsibility regarding my children. I'd like to do that now if I may."

Gage blinked, and found himself caught in a coughing fit when the mom's comment thoroughly surprised the snot out of him. He waved away Roy and the mother both when they looked over at him in concern.  
"Ahhh, ..about his ankle, ma'am..."

"Which one?" she sniffed curiously, looking down. She was completely worry free.

"The left one. Uh, right there." Johnny said, pointing and pulling up the dusty boy's pants leg.

"Stan, is your foot still sore?" the mother asked her adventurous boy.

"Nope. It's better now. See?" and he stamped his paramedic unsneakered foot against the pavement in a few solid smacks. "And a bandaid will fix the nick on my face. It's not even bleeding any more."

"I'll get you one out of my knapsack once we're in the car. Come on, we better not waste anymore of these fine gentlemen's time. The longer we wait to get Zephyr and his son treated the slower their recovery period'll be." And she scribbled on the line Roy pointed to on the form, efficiently swift.

Cap couldn't hold himself back any longer. He approached. "Ms..,do you realize how much it costs citizen taxpayers to haul out three fire stations for a high rise building rescue?"

"I didn't call for you. They did.." she neatly told Cap, pointing to the glaring traffic policemen, without breaking her bubbly expression. "Take it up with them." And with that, the biologist mother bustled up both birds, both of her kids, and promptly made herself gone.

Cap sighed through tight lips and actually sat down on the engine's side bumper in full view of all the curious business district onlookers currently on their lunchbreaks who were out to view the fire department's unexpected showing.

Gage joined him, and Roy, too, folding out of their sweaty paramedic turnouts,  
into utterly exhausted piles on either side of him.

"How do you feel about this one, Cap?" Johnny groaned, a hand over his eyes.

"Just terrific..." he growled sarcastically, replying as he rubbed his own. Then Cap lifted his HT. "Engine 51, L.A. Snorkle Truck 110, Stations 8 and 51 are now one hundred percent...available."

##Engine 51.##

A long interval of stupefaction overtook all three firemen as the call's tensions drained away. Then Hank spoke. "You won't hear this from the cops or from our dear departing ditching victims, either, I'm afraid. But,... nice job up there, you two. That was absolutely fabulous high angle work you did for them."

"Thanks, Cap." Roy said, not moving.  
"Appreciate it.." Gage echoed, just as immobile. "Ow,..I think.."

Cap rose and helped each of his climb rubbery men, to their feet.  
"Come on. We've got to clear out of the streets. A set of showers isn't much to offer, I know. But I'll turn your bunks down myself for the naps you two have just earned yourselves big time."

But the naps the squad crew rightfully earned would never come that afternoon.  
Because then, something happened that no one could've ever predicted.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photo: Cap, saying why me in front of the engine.

Photo: Johnny and Roy getting ready for bed.

Photo: A peregrine near a rooftop nest.

Photo: Johnny, exhausted, outside by the engine.

*  
From : wone3 Sent : Monday, November 14, 2005 7:20 PM Subject : [EmergencyTheaterLive] Roller Disco

At Rampart Hospital, the day had been moving along.

While not totally overly busy, the doctors and nurses on duty had seen their fair share of patients but still had time for short breaks in between. Doctors Kel Brackett and Mike Morton were presently among the ones on duty along with Head Nurse Dixie McCall. Joe Early would be coming on later in the day after having a day off. He was substituting for another doctor on vacation that week.

Presently, Kel and Dixie were in treatment room two with a patient, a Miss Stephanie Miller. Stephanie had been watching the latest show on TV where the dancers were performing roller disco and had decided to go outside and try it herself. She wasn't going too badly until her spins got totally out of control and her legs got twisted. She then went tumbling to the cement trying to catch herself on the way down. She was sitting in the treatment room with her left wrist and both ankles splinted, awaiting surgery that the x-rays indicated she needed. Kel had thought based on a few observations that Stephanie might be anemic based on her vital signs and asked for samples to be taken down to the lab. The x-rays had returned, but the lab results hadn't yet, which was totally unusual. Kel Brackett was getting impatient to get his patient up to surgery to set the breaks that the x-rays revealed, and Dixie could tell.

"Doctor, do you want me to go down to the lab and see what the hold up is?" Dixie asked.

"If you would, Nurse," Kel answered and then quietly leaned in and said, "I'll meet you in the lounge to share a cup of coffee after you return with the results."

"Ok, doctor. Let me make sure the base station is covered and I'll go down." she replied with a knowing smile as she exited the treatment room.

Dixie walked down the hall and noticed Carol by the base station. Dixie told Carol where she was headed and asked her to stay by the desk since she knew that Station 51 was out on a call. Carol reassured her that she'd stay at the desk, and Dixie headed to the stairs leading to the new basement laboratory.

The basement laboratory was down a rather long hall once Dixie reached the bottom of the stairs. There were several storage rooms and former abandoned labs between the stairs and the new lab. A couple of the storage rooms still had oxygen stored inside and one of those rooms was an old lab that still had old, usable wiring.

However, the wiring in this room hadn't been checked in a very long time and the safety coating on the wires had worn away exposing the bare metal. Electricity was still flowing through this room and several rooms adjoining it, including a storage room near the new lab.

A technician had gone into the adjoining storage room and turned on the light to retrieve something, sending electricity through the entire circuit. The wiring in the old lab couldn't take it and sparked, setting the wiring in the wall on fire. The fire in the wall spread quickly outward to the wall's surface and down the wall coming closer to the stored oxygen.

As Dixie passed in front of the door to that lab, the fire reached the stored oxygen causing a big, loud blast. The blast took the door of that room off of its hinges, slamming it into Dixie; and slamming both of them into the wall across the way. Dixie immediately blacked out.

Upon hearing the blast Kel said...

-  
Photos: None.

*  
From: "Monster Moofie" Date: Tue Nov 15, 2005 6:58 pm Subject: 51's new clothes

A clothes line above 51's crew snapped, raining down its contents onto the unsuspecting guys. Johnny now was wearing an underwear hat, and Marco was covered in pink, polka dot and zebra striped socks. The line could not have fallen any more perfectly onto Chet,  
allowing a size 28 dress to float onto the unsuspecting fireman,  
fitting over his turnout coat perfectly. Unfortunately for Johnny,  
Chet and Marco, the clothes had just been hung and they were still soaking wet.

Cap's jaw fell open as he watched his crew be clobbered with clothes. He couldn't help it and dissolved into hysterical laughter, along with Roy, Mike and stations 8 and snorkel 110.

A crewman from 8's said to Chet, "Madam, would you have this dance with me?" causing the rest of the crew to nearly collapse on the ground in laughter.

Red faced, Chet threw off the dress and headed back to the engine and got in. Johnny and Marco followed suit, followed by a bunch of laughing hyenas.

Johnny muttered as he went. "So much for a nap this afternoon. I'm too awake now and the guys won't stop laughing until a month of Sundays has passed."

"We really ought to make a supply run anyway, Johnny," Roy advised his sulking partner. "Remember? We didn't have time this morning."

"Ok let's go." Johnny replied. "Cap we're going to make a supply run." he advised.

The crews got in their vehicles, heading back to their respective stations. Squad 51 headed to Rampart.

Shortly, Squad 51 was pulling into Rampart's driveway. Watching the ER grow larger, Johnny said, "I sure hope they have a fresh pot of coffee! I could sure use a cup about now."

Roy backed up and parked and the paramedics were getting out of the squad when an explosion shook the building.

Johnny looked at Roy and saw the look of dread mirrored in Roy's face that he knew must be on his own. He picked up the microphone and radioed dispatch.

-  
Photos: None.

*  
From : Cory Anda Sent : Wednesday, November 16, 2005 11:10 AM Subject : Underground..

The shake that had rattled Kel's teeth, died away.

"What the--?!"  
Then Dr. Brackett remembered his limb fractured young skater and immediately curbed his first natural instinct to get loud in his shock about the concussion he just felt and heard through the floor tiles. "Easy. I know that sounded a little frightening.  
I'm going to go out and find out what that was. Stay here, Miss Miller. I'll have an orderly let you know what's going on just as soon as I do."  
he promised with a barely believable smile.

Kel fled the treatment room for the front desk.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dr. Llewellyn, the orthopedic surgeon Kel had asked for, was shouting at the panicking nurses gathering around reception.  
"Quiet! Security's already on the way down there to see if the way's open to that level. But no one, absolutely no one else is allowed to go into that area until the fire department says it's ok to enter there!" said the jowled white moustached doctor in scrubs. "I will not add to any casualties intentionally.  
Is that clear?!"

Kel immediately shouldered into the bunch taking charge. "Benjamin. What happened?!"

"Explosion. In the south lab's outbuilding basement, offshooting the main hospital proper." said Llewewllyn quickly.

"How do you know that?"

"Because I stuck my head out the doctor's lounge window, and I looked! Don't get stupid on me, Kel. I know you're worried about Dixie McCall. We all are. That's at least half the cause of all the pandemonium going on around here." replied the older doctor saucily.

Kel took a deep breath, one that he could feel down into his very heels and he barely curbed an angry outburst. "Ok, ok...you're right.  
I'm not thinking clearly yet. But I'm gonna change that right now by getting a hold of the fire department." he said, grabbing up the red phone only used in the worst emergencies.

Ben grabbed his arm. "I'll let you know what the security guards discover, I promise that, Kel. But after you make the call, triage must take the priority. The junior M.D.'s can handle patient management without us while we get everything ready to run hot. Morton's already applying his unique brand of diplomacy as you can see.." and the surgeon pointed to the waiting room.

Dr. Brackett saw that Mike was in his deepest professional colors,  
issuing orders to his staff and reassuring those in the waiting room that their immediate safety was not in jeopardy. "Yes, there's a fire.  
But it's in the next building. Please, everybody remain seated and calm. There is no need for an evacuation as yet. I'll have a spokes person fill you in once help arrives and after they've assessed our current ongoing damage. Please, if you'll excuse me.." he shouted over the noisy babble of people. "I'm needed by my superiors."  
Dr. Morton neatly extricated himself from the public's eye to join Ben and Kel.

Dr. Brackett saw that he already had soot on his face as he hung up the phone with the fire dispatching center. "How bad is it, Mike?"

"Bad enough." said Morton.

"Did you see any sign of--"

"No, Kel. I didn't. The stairwell ceiling's partially caved in, in that underground tunnel walkway. But the smoke didn't smell like chemicals to me. Only like burning cardboard. If Dixie had time to make it down there after leaving your treatment room, she won't have inhalation poisoning to deal with."

"No, only one tiny complication...called a roaring fire, Mike." he growled,  
clearly not happy in the slightest as he kept the worst of his agitation low so no one not medical would overhear.

Morton had nothing else to say. So he put his attempt at reassurance into physical action. "I'm going to meet the first fire crews at the ER entrance and let them know what we've got."

Ben Llewellyn added more. "And I'll go up to the sixth floor to get the blueprints of the tunnelways under the parking lot leading to that lab building."

Dr. Brackett nodded. Then he spotted Roy and Johnny, masking up in scba gear, jogging down the hallway towards them with fire extinguishers in both of their hands.

Gage wasted no time. "Doc, help's already on the way."

"I know." Brackett tried to grin. "They told me. Guys, can you go check it out? There's a good chance Dixie might be trapped. No one's heard from her since it happened. " His face twisted in horrified guilt. "I asked her to go check on some results down there."

Roy was level headed. "Dr. Brackett. What's in that lab?"

"Just tissue sampling equipment and storage. The basics. Nothing substantial like fuel or other volatile chemicals. But there's a supply room of surgical gas tanks right next door on the same level in the sub-basement. That's probably what went up." Kel said, mincing on his toes as he fretted.

"What about biohazards?" Gage asked as he tested his mask's air flow regulator with a few taps.

"The fire will take care of the small stuff. Don't worry, the type fours are all well away from the fire in another unconnected building. Including samples of your monkey virus, Johnny. All the cultures Rapid Lab deals with are your usual garden variety emergency room ache and moan bugs, exclusively."

"I think we can handle the sniffles, don't you think, Johnny?" Roy joked.

Kel immediately took solace in DeSoto's shammed calm. "I'll hand you the kleenix boxes myself. Can you just go? I thought you guys can scout around without a captain's order as long as you have a charged hose."

"We can." said Gage.

"Good." said the older, listening bone surgeon. "There's one in the west stairbay. But, uh, don't try the east way down. Dr. Morton says it's blocked by ceiling debris." said Dr. Llewellyn.

The silent Dr. Morton, next to him, nodded.

"We're on it." said Johnny. He and Roy ran back outside to the squad to grab tools and irons.

Together, they ran into the smoke pouring out of the lab building in Rampart's shadow as the sound of responding fire station sirens began filling the air.

Photo: Brackett, Gage and DeSoto in an urgent huddle at Rampart in the hallway.

Photo: Morton, seated, looking urgent.

Photo: DeSoto's jacketed back as he is grabbing gear out of the squad.

Photo: Gage and DeSoto in full scba gear, heading down to a lower level floor in an elevator.

*  
From: "Roxy Dee"  
Subject: Plan of Attack Date: Fri Nov 18, 2005 1:53 pm

Battalion 14 rose out of the driver's seat of his red chief's car and surveyed the scene around the lab building as arriving fire stations filled in around him on all quadrants of the fire site that was showing clear of blast debris. He got on his radio mic's bullhorn. ##Station 36 : See if you can determine an estimate of the numbers trapped and their possible locations.  
Engine 8 : Ascertain the type and extent of the damage to the building, any hazards and where they are. Battalion One: Get on top of what rescues are currently underway right now. L.A. specified that two from Squad 51 are in the immediate vicinity and responding. Engine 51: Cover the north exposure and lay out two inch and a halves in a water curtain over the main tunnel entrance. Use extreme caution.  
This is a hazmat priority one until we find out otherwise.## he ordered. ##Ladder Nine : Cover the west side with your equipment for an external attack only. Stations 24 and 18 : Start handling these walking wounded in the parking lot and remove all other casualities from non-difficult situations as you find them. Do not enter the fire area with scba until we get Squad 51's initial scene status report. Engine 10 : Search areas of high survivability, blocked by light debris only, until after we've received positive feedback from Squad 51.  
Anyone else: Report anything critical to note, directly to me.##

The chief of the district nodded in grim satisfaction as all phases of the operation around Rampart took shape and acknowledged his overall plan. To his practiced eye, it was bad. ::The subterranean tunnel networks in these hospitals always beg for trouble whenever one of them goes up. And it looks like this one has, the whole way under the parking lot. My secondary concern is the stability of the asphalt infrastructure over the tunnels leading directly to the lab building.  
Cars can and will tumble into the fire zones underground if the temperatures underneath rise high enough. And then we'll have exploding gasoline tanks from collapsed cars to manage as further risks.:: he reasoned. But he kept his worries to himself while his eyes drank in the disaster site for more information. His right hand clutched the now live HT tuned to Squad 51's duty active frequency in a grip of iron. Tightly.

Glancing over his shoulder, he spotted some hospital staffers already setting up triage inside Rampart's helicopter hanger. Some were milling about behind his car with laden gurneys and ambu bags. He flagged down a pair of them who seemed to have a doctor in their midst judging by the stethoscope around one silver haired man's neck.

He gestured the blue jumpsuited team over.

"Chief?" asked Dr. Joe Early. "I just got word. Any victims yet?" he asked the white helmeted fireman as he checked and rechecked airways and crash cart medications under the stretcher's buckled straps.

"Squad 51's on a rapid recon to find at least one. Stick arou--."  
A sweeping plume of dust like a wind devil suddenly billowed around them and all three of them started choking. The chief shielded his face, using a hospital blueprint map as cover. Battalion 14's voice shouted over a sudden roaring sound in disbelief.  
"Is that chopper running hot?"

"Yeah." answered Dr. Morton, who was teamed up with Joe, glancing over to the hospital's roof and eyeing it. "Guess they figured they'd be ready for any critical evacs once we fill up."

The chief immediately got on his full, wide bandwidth channel. ##Copter 2. Power down immediately! Your backdrafts are raising dust that'll suffocate our exposed victims! You and you alone are grounded until this scene's fully contained. Shut down all systems and report to triage to aid operations!##

The pilot complied instantly. He had been unable to see the effect of his rotor wash through all the smoke spilling from the violated lab.

Battalion 14 turned back to the sheepish doctors. "He meant well but that was inexcusable. I've been telling the county to train pilots as firefighters but they never listen!"

"Someday, perhaps." Joe admitted. "Look how long it took Kel Brackett to get your department to accept the paramedic program."

"Point taken. I guess progress is always slow when you want things to move along faster than the established bureaucracy. How many victims can your teams handle in triage?"

"As many as you can give us, chief. We've recalled all available hospital staff in for this emergency." empathized Morton.

"Good man. I'll let you know when those in the building are finally outta there."

"We'll be waiting." said Joe Early.

The two doctors retreated to the chopper's hanger to radio from their portable base station to the paramedic one inside Rampart about the walking wounded being rushed through their propped open ambulance doors.

Battalion 14 turned back towards the fire. ::Okay boys, I've done my part.:: he wished at Squad 51's men. ::Now tell me what you're doing for yours..::

-  
Photos: None.

*  
From: "Champagne Scott" Date: Fri Nov 18, 2005 8:47 pm Subject: Debris Pile...

Roy turned from his fast rummaging through the squad when his partner tapped him urgently on the shoulder.

"Would you look at that?!" Johnny mumbled, his face going slack.

DeSoto looked. "The upper story's going?"

"That's got to be an elevator shaft. I thought Brackett said that all the passages leading to the effected building are underground."

"That was my impression. Let's get going, junior." he said,  
hefting up an extra set of scba air bottles to leave by the entrance for themselves. "Time's more than wasting."

"You don't have to tell me twice." Gage said empathetically.

They noted the arriving fire response with a sidelong glance and then they had their masks on and found themselves embedded in the sublet staircasing leading underground. Immediately, the smoke grew thick. But it was white.

::Clean burning.:: Roy thought automatically as he tied off both their lifelines to a railing at the foot of the parking lot's stairs. He left the bright yellow clump of airbottles as a conspicuous marker to show other units where they had entered the fire zone.

"Dixie?!" Gage began to shout as they began their search of the rooms immediately around them with sharp kicks to locked doors and hastily scrawled 'room empty' chalk marks.  
They started working quickly towards the orange fire glow remnants that they could see left over from the initial explosion. As they got nearer, the atmosphere around them grew clearer and more free of billowing smoke.

"There's a hole to the outside around here somewhere." Roy grunted through his respirator's mouth piece at Johnny.

"Yeah, and it's gonna fan up the bad stuff." he said kicking away a pile of lumber that had fallen from the ceiling after making doubly sure no live wires were crisscrossing through the middle of them. "I wonder if the hospital engineers know to shut off the utilities and power down here?" Gage shouted. "Dixie?!"

"If they don't, Battalion will be sure to remind them." DeSoto replied back,  
making another chalk marked "X" on the door of the room that had proven itself to contain no downed victims. "Dixie! Can you hear me?!"  
he chorused right after Johnny.

There was no reply from the missing nurse in the relative quiet.

Gage was growing more nervous. "I don't like this, it's too easy.  
Where's the heart of the fire, Roy? The explosion's origin?"

They came to a T junction intersection of hallways where they faced no possible good choice, but to split up, in order to still rapidly cover the search area.

"One thing at a time, junior, one thing at a time. Whatdiya want?  
Left side or right side?" DeSoto said falsely confident.

"I'll follow my writing hand." Gage said turning left. "Keep in contact,  
partner, over the HT every thirty seconds." he panted with effort. "I say, too, that we pull out for our next set of air bottles in.  
six and a half minutes..Tops."

"Done.." Roy gasped.

They separated, following the oddly normal looking corridors of the lab's reception area, casting about for audible moaning or the sight of singed bodies on the floor.

A minute later, Gage's voice came over the frequency. ##I got one, Roy! He's in the freight elevator! You were right about that change. The fire's vertically climbing around the shaft!##

DeSoto didn't stop his own searching, and he stumbled over debris;  
some unseen carts and a couple of concussion tipped towel storage shelves lying in piles in the dimness. "Need help with him?" Roy shouted into his walkie.

Johnny's breaths came in whistles over Roy's radio as he hefted up the semi conscious orderly's back against a wall using the sooty man's feet as anchors under his own so he could tumble him between his shoulder and his air bottle in a fireman's carry. ##Nah, I'll be faster on my own. Keep looking for Dixie! I'm headed outside with this guy and I'll be right back! * cough.*cough* ##

"Ok, I'll be watching for ya!"

Gage's breathing came painfully rapid due to the fatigue that he had been fighting since the skyscraper climb after the peregrine falcon admiring kids.  
He rested for a long moment at the foot of the short stairs leading up to the parking lot before heading back into the daylight with his half out victim.

Captain Stanley met him there and Johnny was rapidly divested of his burden. "He breathing?"

"Yeah!" Gage gasped, peeling off his mask. He folded into an indian style crouch onto the ground, sucking in the much cooler, fresher air now swirling amply around him as he recovered from the rescue.

"Ok, give me the short of it." Hank ordered. "What's in there?"  
the tall commander demanded as they both watched Chet and Marco carry off the luckless lab orderly to the nearby triage center set up in the heliport hanger, on a backboard. Cap and Gage watched as the man was richly ventilated with pure oxygen from a demand valve in time with his own weaker inhalations as he was carried away from them.

Gage stretched out onto his side, not even bothering to remain seated as he talked. He began checking and rechecking the integrity of the knots on his lifeline that was still whole and attached to his scba's harness. "There's no sign of discoloration in the smoke or flames, Cap. So no chemical spills there, but we can't seem to find the center of things either. It's real weird inside. Blast damage is all around us concentrically, not located just in one or two places..."

"Hmm." said Hank, thinking. "A large scale trigger field, huh? Perhaps the news is true then, that a faulty wire in the surgical gas store room along with a slowly leaking oxygen tank, is the cause of it all. There'd be little flame in a situation like that after the flashpoint."

"That's a thought." Johnny said. He grabbed Hank's arm. "Cap, I think everybody got out. There wasn't a single soul down there,.. except for him."

Cap started to grin.

"And maybe...Dixie McCall."

"What?!" Hank uttered, horrified.

"Brackett says Dixie came down to this particular lab after some results on a fracture patient. He mentioned that there's a good chance she may have been in the lab itself next to Surgical Supply at the time of the explosion because she hasn't been seen by anyone since then." Johnny told him.

"Have you two searched down that far yet?"

"Roy's working on it."

"How are you two doing fatigue wise?"

"We're....fine." Johnny lied.

"What about THAT fire?" Cap said jerking his head at the blaze sputtering out the top window of the freight elevator shaft.

"That's only the greased cable burning and then probably the start of the roof of the shaftworks room. It's doesn't have a lot of fuel to go anyplace else, Cap."

"Ok,..Get back in there. I'll have a hose team on your backs in two minutes." Cap promised. "See you in four when you change out your bottles." Johnny rose and turned to leave when he felt Hank jerk him to a halt by a bottle strap. "Wait! Gimme your out tags first!"

Johnny sheepishly handed Hank both Roy's and his, metal id incident tags for the chief's status and personnel board from a special clip on his jacket.

Cap patted Gage's back encouragingly and gave him a push back down the subterranean stairs after his paramedic had reapplied his air mask and had his helmet returned to his head tightly. Then, he got on his HT on the squad's frequency. "Engine 51 to HT 51 DeSoto! Your position?"

Inside the crackling, but only fitfully burning, shattered lab, Roy studied a door.  
##Suite 9-A, heading, uh,... heading towards the east wing.##

"10-4." Hank said watching his best rescue man return down into the smoke with trepidation.

------------------------------------------

Back inside, Johnny quickly caught up with Roy. "How's your air, pally?"

"Five minutes left. Yours?"

"Same. Let's go." Johnny said, yanking on his trailing lifeline so it wouldn't snag on obstacles.

"That corridor's clear! There's no one else." he said when Johnny wanted to continue where he had left off.

"Ok," Gage gasped, hurrying alongside his partner down the final wing still left unexplored. Soon, they spotted a form on the carpetting next to a warped, force torn, now floor stretched, door. "Female victim! Ohmyg*d. Is that Dixie?"

"Sure is!" Roy celebrated through his steamy mask. But then his great fear bit home."Dixie?! ....Hey, can you hear me? Dixie!!"

She was lying face down and didn't move in the slightest at the sound of their yelling voices or noisy, tanks clattering approach.

Johnny swiftly knelt onto his knees after kicking burning cinders away from her hair with his feet and he peeled off a glove to grope at the angle of her neck for a carotid. Frowning, he groped again, digging deeper. Finally..."She's alive. But her pulse's very weak and thready."

Roy let out the breath he was holding as he carefully started untangling her limbs enough for them to log roll Dixie onto her back to look for life threatening injuries past the unconsciousness and for a quick listen and feel for signs of adequate breathing.

But then, a belching roar of fire suddenly vomited expansively out of the supply room along the ceiling over their heads, making the two masked paramedics immediately duck to cover their heads and torsos over Dixie's smoking body.

A full sized monster oxygen cylinder gave way and blew up, shooting through the ceiling, on fire.

"Let's get her out of here!" Gage gasped. "Before another one of those tanks works loose, falls, and fires at us like a rocket!"

Swiftly, they pushed bits of ceiling and gas cylinder chains off the shattered door that had impacted outwards into Dixie, and gently, they eased her in a safe spine line onto it for use as an improvised emergency stretcher. A few seconds later, they jog carried her lying on it, to the safety of the T junctured hallway. They both settled onto the floor over her instantly then, so they could get back on McCall's head for a more thorough breathing check.

Roy opened her airway further with a modified jaw thrust. "She's still doing it." he said, studying the slight rise and fall of her stained uniform's chest. He quickly placed his air mask over McCall's face in a clean air offering. "No coughing though."

"That's far better than being dead, Roy. Count your blessings. Dixie?" Gage prompted, feeling up McCall's arms and legs for fractures or major bleeding. "Can you hear me? It's Johnny Gage. We've just found you in the lab."

She didn't respond to him, not even to a pain check.

DeSoto got on the HT. "Squad 51 to Engine 51. We found our victim! She's deeply unconscious and in severe shock. We're in the south corridor, thirty yards and ninety degrees left from our exterior stairway."

##Sending in a stokes backup team now!## Hank replied over the radio.

Roy was about to insert an oral airway into Dixie's mouth from his jacket's pocket,  
so they could leave with her without the worry of a tongue/airway obstruction, when a fierce cascade of explosions from behind, rocked them both off of their knees.

It also caused the corridor's ceiling to start raining thickly down in pieces around them. Sickeningly, a lightweight truck from the parking lot above slid into the gaping hole newly made in the ceiling, and pinned all three of them underneath a vast debris pile of rafters and the Ford's smouldering gasoline tank, now impact jarred free of the sunken 4 X 4.  
The two paramedics didn't even have time enough to scream as the vehicle came tumbling down in a massive roar of dirt and shattered cement blocks.

-  
Photos: None.

*  
From: "finiterider" Date: Sun Nov 20, 2005 9:03 pm Subject: Two Bulls in a China Shop.

Kel Brackett was beside himself with more than just a little worry for Nurse Dixie McCall. He was so preoccupied with listening to the fire department scanner over the main ER desk for any word about her, that he never heard the soft tread of Dr. Fred Hathaway arrive until a gentle hand set onto his shoulder.

"Kel?"

"What?!" Brackett startled, whirling on the seat of his stool. He also bumped his elbow smartly against the cardiac telemetry monitor in a sharp crack. "Ouch! GaaHHhh ! D*mmit! Now I've done it.." and he curled fingers around it and locked his body up in a grimace from the arm pain.

Fred immediately stabilized his coworker's elbow in a concerned automatic surgeon's reflex. "Ooo, geesh. I'm sorry, Kel. I should've given warning ahead of time. I know how keyed up you get during a blitz like this. Let me take a look at that." he offered in a not-a-question tone.

Dr. Brackett ...reluctantly, ...rolled up his sleeve. "It's not your fault, Fred.  
I should know better than to let myself get that way in the first place."  
he sighed. His irritation put gravel into his voice and all degrees of his trademark gruffness. "Feels like just a knock on the nerve. It's nothing."  
he deflected falsely.

Fred softly checked the bony structures of Brackett's elbow and eased the joint through a small range of motions. He stopped when Kel's face twisted tightly. "Pretty unfunny for just a funny bone, Kel. You're ballooning up here transversely...... I think.. " he said, feeling around carefully. "..that you actually ...managed to dislocate this, my friend."

"No way.." Brackett looked up, fiercely.

But Fred noticed that he didn't move his arm an inch. He watched as five shades of red shot through his coworker's face in utter mortification. It made him instantly want to remedy things.  
"I can reduce it before it stiffens on you.." Dr. Hathaway said, ducking down in equal confidence, keeping low so no one would discover the situation with Kel's arm.

"Fred, I can't leave now. Are you insane?!" Kel whispered so no one would notice them and his present embarrassing difficulty.

"I'm a surgeon specialist, remember? I don't need a surgical ward or tools to realign a dislocated elbow." And with that, Fred took hold of Kel's armpit and forearm and gave it a practiced, firm jerk that literally picked Brackett up off of the stool. A bright jolt of pain shot across Kel's eyes but then,  
the agony was gone. Just like that. It was as if the arm had never been injured.

Kel blinked then, suddenly aware of Fred holding him upright by the shoulders, waiting patiently until Kel got his full senses back.

"Need a few smelling salts, Mr."Fainter"?" whispered Fred.

"No." Kel spat acidly, whipping his repaired arm away from Fred. "I'm fine!.. Uh,.. thank you. Your trademark trick still works like a charm. Now go get me some coffee and tell me why you're down here." he said, changing the subject swiftly with some real anger.

Fred got the fortifying drink promptly. He set it down before Kel whom he knew wasn't about to take sips from it.  
"You know why. I came down here to find out about a mutual acquaintance of ours. You know her. She's got blonde hair, an absolutely stunning smile with a pure saxophone silky voice to match?"

Kel pretended ignorance as he turned up the volume of the fire scanner to drown out Fred's voice. He remained stonily silent, clearly displeased with being in such close proximity to his companion.

Fred kept going relentlessly, still mild and cheerful. "Am I ringing a bell? She's got a five letter word for a first name beginning with a D and ending with an--"

That was quite enough for Kelly Brackett. He turned and pegged his best glare of full fledged professional irritation that wasn't professional in the slightest in actual reality. "Fred. Let's get straight to the point,  
shall we? I don't know anything yet. Would I have both ears glued to the L.A. county fire monitor if I knew the slightest scrap of anything at all?"

"No. I guess you wouldn't." Fred agreed. But then he changed the subject.  
"I thought we were friends, Kel. So I was the one Dixie turned to after she left you. So what? It's no big deal. I'm also standing in the dumped beau line right after you, so lighten up a little. Let's put our mutual emotional differences aside and worry about posturing later after we find out whether or not the woman we still both have some feelings for is still in the land of the living, all right?"

Kel said nothing.

"I'm sure Joe Early would have a lot to say about how we're behaving right now if he were here. I may have fixed Joe's heart but he sure knows the state of the two of ours concerning Dixie I'll just bet."

Dr. Brackett sighed hugely, groping at some ghosting humility.  
"You're right. We're acting like a couple of kids in the school sandbox." he said, rising to fiddle yet again with the empty patient information clipboard waiting on the table for the first paramedic team's call from the base station. "I'm just disgusted that it took something bad happening to Dixie in order to get us in the same place at the same time, in the same room together, Fred. Don't you feel that way, too?"

"I do." Fred said, biting his lip, looking suddenly vulnerable for the first time.

Kel met his eyes in a matching look, mirroring the same emotion. "Care to go out there for me and poke around a little after her?"

"In a heartbeat." said the cardiovascular surgeon with a grin. "I'll keep her safe after they get her to us, and I'll tell you absolutely everything I'm doing for her treatment wise while I'm doing it, ok?"

"I'm holding you to that. As doctor to doctor. " Kel said pointing a finger up in emphasis.

"Consider it done. After all, you're the boss."

And with that, Fred was gone.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos: None.

*  
From: Sam Iam Date: Wed Nov 23, 2005 1:11 pm Subject: The Different Eye

Chet Kelly came running. "Cap! Cap!" he shouted.

Hank Stanley felt an instant stab of dread even before he addressed his man about what the problem was. "Kelly!  
Why aren't you on the stokes crew assignment for Roy and Johnny's new victim?"

"Infrastructure's collapsed right over their position." he panted, sweating profusely. Only then did Stanley see that the curly haired fireman was coated with plaster dust and insulation fibers. "We were almost there when a truck in the parking lot melted through the ceiling."

"You guys got water going into there?"

"Yeah. Marco and Stoker are fanning the pile right now through the asphalt."

"Ok, I'll get the chief." Hank told him, patting Chet on the shoulder while he leaned over and hacked up pulverized building material from his mouth and throat. "When you're set, head back there to dig them all out." Cap ordered as he toggled his HT. "Engine 51 to Battalion 14. Emergency! Cave in at HT 51's location. Thirty yards south of a ninety from their ground point entry, going left. We're gonna need all the man power we can get for an underground operation. Our possible total victim number trapped is a count of three. Two are Code I. Note that ample water cover is in place."

##10-4, Engine 51. I'll route personnel your way a.s.a.p.  
Stand fast at your posting to give the arriving crews details of your situation.##

"10-4, Battalion 14. Engine 51 out."

Soon, L.A.'s tones sounded out the upgrade alert over every walkie talkie and truck radio in the area. ##L.A. to Station 36 and Engine 10 : 10-19 the southern exposure with Engine 51. Multiple trapped victims have been reported underground. Situation : Code I plus one. Time out. 13:56.##

Hank was grateful for the dispatcher's hint that firefighters were involved. ::That'll make them arrive that much faster to me:  
Captain Stanley turned to where he could see Chet Kelly, Marco Lopez and Mike Stoker clustered over the gaping smoking hole in the middle of the parking lot, raining a thick fan of water down into it, trying to suppress the active flames they could see erupting from around the rear bumper of the truck sticking out of the hole.

He looked at his watch and saw that there was only two minutes left on his mental countdown. After that, the air in both Johnny and Roy's bottles would run out and they would both fall into serious breathing shortage rapidly. ::Why didn't I tell Johnny to take in the spare scba tanks with him going back in?:: Then another voice in his head told him the reason why coolly. ::Because you knew that they had Dixie McCall to find. Don't be surprised that you'd get absolutely the fastest way to rescue such a close friend in that kind of danger involving some risk. It's only natural. :: said his conscience. ::You're still doing your job properly.::

Hank hated that inner voice. It took away the guilt he wanted to feel just then and it sounded a lot like his wife's voice the more he thought about it. Then the emotional pain truly gripped him. :: Roy's wife will be devastated if she thought I let anything happen to her husband.:: That put fear deep into his chest. He lifted his HT again, quickly.  
"Engine 51 to Battalion 14. Uh,.. CIS channel?"

##Switching over.## replied Battalion 14.

Captain Stanley fidgetted until he heard his chief come over the new private frequency.

##What's up, Hank?##

"Chief, I read last month that Ladder Nine was trial testing a new device that reads heat. Do they have one with them now?"

##That just might be a winning ticket, captain. I had forgotten about that thing. I'll send them straight away. Get that hallway your men used cooled down well so the image contrasts will be cleaner. ##

"Copy that, chief. Thanks."

##No, thank you. That was original thinking, the kind that always saves lives. I still think you're wasted at the captain's level. Don't turn down the next promotion when it comes, Hank. I'd still love to have you wearing the white before I retire. ##

"I've got a year to think about it. You're not sixty four yet, sir."

##Good luck with the IR camera. I'll be crossing my fingers behind my back. All of them.##

Cap grinned. "Engine 51 out, switching back to main channel."

Hank got the fire companies newly assigned to him, cracking,  
when they appeared a short time later.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photo: A firefighter with an infrared imaging camera.

*  
From: "Cassidy Meyers" Date: Wed Nov 23, 2005 9:26 pm Subject: The Inactive Action..

Dr. Hathaway made his way around the barricades marking the boundaries of the hot zone until he came to the triage center.  
Already, he could see seventeen or eighteen being treated.

None of them, was Dixie.

He turned to the nearest doctor he saw; Dr. Morton.  
"Mike, you got things in hand here?" he asked with his voice. But outwardly, his eyes were still casting about for the lost Nurse McCall. ::Oh, my G*d. Where is she?:: his mind raced. ::Why are things taking so long?::

"Yeah, pretty much. Did Kel send you for an update?" the blue jumpsuited resident asked.

"Something like that." he evaded and quickly stepped around a young woman being treated for smoke inhalation. Before the young doctor could ask Fred more, Hathaway walked swiftly away from him towards his next target, Dr. Joe Early.

"Joe, what have they told you so far about Dixie? Have they located her yet?"

Dr. Early looked up from the leg he was splinting on the orderly that Johnny Gage had rescued from the laboratory tunnels. "Not yet.  
But things have just gotten worse. There's been a cave-in reported."

"A cave-in?! Oh, Joe.. I've got to get over there!"

"Good luck crossing the fire line." said Early, not even looking up. "I already tried that, until my sense of duty about taking care of these casualties got the better of me."

"I want to help, Joe. But just over there. How can they turn down a doctor's help? They'll listen to me, I'm sure of it. I know the lay out of the labs. They can do things my way. I just want to offer them another opinion."

Joe turned on the EKG monitor that he had hooked up on the moaning orderly and he started studying it intently. "I'm sure that the fire department will set you straight instantly if you try to take matters into your own hands."

Fred sighed, running fingers through his hair. "Don't you care about Dixie?"

Joe Early looked up with a flash of fury. "Of course I do. We all do, Hathaway.  
But first we have an obligation to fulfill here. And if that means providing triage for the fire department then by G*d, I'll provide it, because that's our job and oathsworn responsibility now by all hospital procedural duty and definition."

"Not mine. Kel ordered me to..." Fred flickered a few agitated fingers. " ....snoop around and investigate a little. So I'm not going to let him down. Or her either, for that matter." he growled defensively.

Joe glared at Hathaway fiercely.

"Call me if you get a critical." Fred sniffed with an angry frown, holding up his triage radio. "It's too bad us surgeons have to wait around for orders and surgical case approval from one of you guys first before working any. But hey, triage handles life threats before scheduling those patients' operations, right?"

Joe remained mute. A part of him wanted Fred to be his eyes, too. For Dixie's sake.

"See you later." said Fred finally. He dashed off into the smoke. "I'll be careful."

Ben Llewellyn, working a short distance away, bandaging a young lab technician's head, said. "That was brainless." he told Joe.

"How so? I warned him." Joe insisted.

"Yeah, but you didn't stop him." said the crusty, blue haired doctor.

Whispering softly to himself, Joe Early looked up into the direction Fred had disappeared, with tears filling his eyes. "I couldn't."

Down in another casualty row, having overheard the tale end of the conversation, Dr. Morton became pure fire. "I would've! Now we'll all get into trouble for letting him go! So much for swearing to watch out for each other my fine, fanciful colleagues. I'm utterly embarrassed and ashamed to think that the fire department is a whole h*ll of a lot better at it than we are."

Joe thought he had a backup plan. "We could always call him, saying that a hospital administrator's ordered him to return."

"With what, son?" snorted Dr. Llewellyn. "Fred's left his radio on top of the crash cart over there."

"Are you sure?"

"Are two doctors always doomed to fall in love with the same nurse?"  
murmured Ben.

Joe Early left his victim's side for a moment to pick it up to confirm the name engraved on its bottom surface.

It was Hathaway's.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos: None.

*  
From: "Roxy Dee" Date: Wed Nov 23, 2005 9:45 pm Subject: The Opposite of Fire Is~~

There was the sound of quiet coughing echoing in the darkness.

After images started burning Roy's retinas before he realized that he had come to. "Dixie?!" He struggled up from where he lay crumpled flat on his back. A jolt of pain through a trapped leg, stopped him. ::Something's pinned me.:: he thought, reaching in the murk for his feet. A searing hot gas tank branded his gloves.  
"Ahh!" He whipped his hands away and lay still once more, listening to the noises around him.

To his left, he could hear breathing, about three feet away from his right elbow. Then DeSoto realized that the weight on his stomach was Johnny's face. "Johnny?" he gasped, pulling off his face mask when the low air alarm started going off.

The electronic howler awoke his partner, who flinched and immediately grunted when he found his legs pinned, too. Roy held him still with both gloves. "You ok?"

"Yeah,...I think so..*cough*."

"Gimme your mask, mine's through.." he croaked. "Gimme a breath,  
then let's shine our lights around us to look for Dixie."

Gage moved into immediate motion as full recent memory of McCall's condition, returned. "Where is she?" he said, pressing the air mask to Roy's face so he could get some relief from the smoke.

"I hear her breathing to my right. *cough* It's labored. Liquidy."  
Roy said hoarsely, sucking in the fresh air from Gage's bottle greedily.

"We gotta flip her over. Can you reach her?" Johnny gasped,  
taking the mask back for himself.

Roy sobbed, feeling the full extent of pain from what felt like a snapped ankle.  
"Ugh!... No. Neither can you. Both of us have a full gas tank and half a ton of rafters lying across the lower halves of our bodies."

"We gotta do something, or she'll choke in a few minutes on that blood."  
Johnny said, aiming his penlight onto Dixie's pale face from where he and his partner lay tangled in the beams from the ceiling.

Roy looked around their small enclosed space carefully. "I've got an idea."

"What?" panted Johnny, laying a dizzy head back down onto Roy's hip so he'd wouldn't be a burden to his breathing.

"G-Give me....your belt." Roy told him. "I've already got mine off."

"What are ya gonna do?" Johnny said, squinting as he kept watching Dixie's respirations.

"Fusebox.."

Johnny grunted, feeling where the tremendous weight of the vehicle pressing down onto them, had him trapped. "I don't get it."

"We shut off the master switch and we ...earn the ability to crank up the ..." Roy grimaced when a spasm shot through his leg. "..oxygen in the room. This is a surgical supply store, remember?" he smiled weakily. He shook his head to clear it.

"I'm stupid. DuhHHhh. Can you reach one of those cylinders?"

"My head's lying on one." Roy grinned, tapping it with a knuckle so Johnny would hear. "The regulator key's in my hand. But first..."

"Yeah, I know we gotta get the power off.. so sparking risk's minimized."

Roy tried to laugh but nothing came out."You're worried about us causing some with all this open flame around?"

"Do you see any fire, Roy? It's pitch back in here. That last explosion must have snuffed it out."

"Wondered why I couldn't ....see too well." Roy drowsed. "Don't think my vision's clear enough for your belt buckle tossing idea, Johnny."

"I'll do it.." he said tightly. "I'm more awake than you. Hyperventilate on that and then hold your breath. I'm gonna need the mask for a bit while I try to snag the handle of that utility box. Keep an ear on Dixie. Her breathing rate's picking up into the crisis range."

Roy gorged on the mask's flowing air and passed it over.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Stars were parading thickly across his vision from hypoxia when he felt Johnny push the mask back over his nose and mouth. He felt his chin get tipped up until he had a clear passage through which to breathe.

"Roy? I did it. Get your senses back. You get the last of the scba's supply. It's got thirty seconds left. Then crank on that O2 full blast when you can. Dixie's up to twenty four a minute."

Roy's limbs felt like pure lead and it was impossible to respond.

"Roy? Can you hear me?"  
He felt Johnny's hand push under his jacket to rest on his stomach,  
monitoring him.

DeSoto finally answered him with a cough as the last feeble stream of waning air from the face plate revived him somewhat. "Sorry. .  
lost track for...a few seconds."

"The air's bad in here. My guess is that it's only from a lack of 02. The explosion used it all up in those flares. Doesn't help that I shut off the ventilation system when I deactivated the power in that fuse box. Come on, you gotta get that done now before we both black out."

Stubbornly, Johnny refused the mask Roy try to hand back to him with a firm grip. He held his partner's eyes with a no nonsense look about it until DeSoto gathered up the strength he needed to lift up his arms.

Roy reached over his head. His hands were bloody and shaking.  
::Is this from me? Or from Johnny? Dixie wasn't bleeding that badly from her tongue bite.:: Gasping hugely, he managed to turn the valve on the E tank until it was wide open and it started pouring out its pure, cool oxygen.

Immediately, clarity returned to both paramedics.

Roy's pain doubled and so did Johnny's, but together, he and Gage shifted the green cylinder's weight on the gravel debris lying underneath them until it was shooting out the oxygen gas right over Dixie's liberally fire ashed head.

They both began shouting to grab the first of her attention.

Dixie emitted a single, weak cough a minute later, finally reacting to their shouts of encouragement. "Dixie? Wake up! Listen to us. Breathe deeper! You're way too shallow to do any good." DeSoto said loudly.

Dixie's suffocation struggles grew as she began to panic in her half state. Stronger and stronger, she flailed her limbs.  
Then they began to weaken and she started turning a deeper blue.

"No.." Roy yelled, trying to reach McCall with either hand. He failed. "Dixie....!"

Gage got an idea and took up a length of splintered wood. He began to poke her in the shoulder firmly. "Dixie! Come on now! You need to roll over onto your side. You've got to get rid of all that cr*p in your mouth or you'll start to breathe it all in."

Dixie's index finger lifted an inch, involuntarily, under their penlights.

"Dixie! Do I have to leave bruises?!" Johnny yelled, losing his temper.

He was about to smack her across the hand with the flat of the board when Dixie gasped. Adrenaline finally made her jerk and flip over onto her face. She landed inches away from the oxygen tank's nozzle and the sharp breeze from it started bringing her around.  
The sounds she began uttering were only half nonsensical noises.

The other half was a healthy bout of swearing. "#$%!*&" said Dixie.

Roy and Johnny began to smile only then and they both fell back onto the ground with a complete sense of relief.

Vocalizing was a good sign in anybody.

They began to watch her closely as she recovered from almost drowning from her tongue's bite wound. A large amount of mouth blood trickled in a stream from between her teeth, to land sizzling in the embers underneath her that were glowing brightly in the oxygen stream.

"Feel like talking now?" Johnny asked her a few minutes later.

McCall didn't answer.

"Come on, I won't bite. You already did that to yourself so I won't, I promise. How's the tongue doing? Are you still bleeding out badly?"

Dixie stayed quiet, sucking in the rich oxygen gratefully.

Johnny started up again. "I know you can hear me, Dixie.  
Your eyes are twitching."  
Dixie sighed without opening them. "Get...me...out.. of here. NOW."  
she said quietly, because of the intense pain still shooting through her head.

"Sorry, we can't really oblige ya. You see, uh, Roy and I both have a truck lying on top of our legs..."

That made Dixie pick up her head. "What?! A truck? How did th--OhhhHHH!" She immediately set it back down again when a sharp wave of dizziness sent a gush of vomit into her throat. She spat it out, turned away from her rescuers, and impatiently waited for the bout of nausea to recede.

It finally did.

"How's your back and neck? We've already guessed about the concussion.." Gage said.

"I'm ok that way." Dixie swallowed dryly. "Why isn't Roy talking any more?"

Johnny glanced over at his partner. Roy was dozing, but his skin remained warm and dry under Johnny's touch. "He's tired.  
That's all. He got our oxygen supply going so give him a break."  
Gage said grimacing, laying his head back down onto Roy's upper leg.

The nurse in Dixie started reappearing. "Speaking of circulation,  
how's it in you guys below both your waists?"

"If I didn't know you better, I'd be taking that as a distinct attempt at a pass, Dixie." Johnny joked, trying to get a rise out of her.

"Really? You're not my type. I reserve all my flirting strictly for men of the white coat persuasion, Mr. Paramedic."

"Huh. Figured that one out years ago. Kel's one h*ll of a lucky guy."

Dixie didn't deign to correct him on exactly where her love life stood just then. "Seriously, Johnny. Will you answer my question? I don't want to have to worry about anyone but myself here, ok?"

She heard Gage sigh, trying to hide a cry of pain.  
"I can feel everything, down to my toes.*gasp* I assume he can, too. Or he would've mentioned that he didn't."

"There's a small mercy. Do they know we're down here?"

"Yes. Roy got out our position before the second explosion separated us from both our walkie talkies."

"Any bleeding on you two?" she asked.

"Nope. Just scratches."

"Spinal injuries?"

"None."

"Broken bones?"

"Uh,...let's leave that one for the attending once we're outta here."

"Johnny.." Dixie warned.

"I ...don't know. I can't reach Roy's lower half to find out and he can't reach mine. You wouldn't happen to be free from debris enough to check on that for us, would you?"

"I.. think I am. But there's this little problem called vertigo happening."

"Oh. In that case, never mind. Prop your head up onto that tank. You need to keep it up with a head injury."

"Practice what you preach. I can see the bruise on your forehead from here." Dixie said. "Lemme spend half a year crawling over to you and I'll help you keep an eye on Roy's pulse. I can do that at least. It doesn't require me to keep my eyes open."

"Lazy." Johnny kidded her.

"No, I'm just honest enough to acknowledge my current limitations."

A sharp hiss and a sudden shift of settling weight made the metal of the fire heated truck in the ceiling groan sickeningly.

Roy's eyes shot open when something pressed down even harder on his thighs. "Ow. Ow. Ow.. sh*t!" he writhed. Then he closed his eyes, and let a string of profanity gush out freely. "Of course it would be me get the lowest end of the truck's bumper on my lap."  
he hissed. "Hurry up, gang, if you know what's good for you.." he grunted,  
throwing up a look at the ceiling in the direction of the working firefighters he thought he heard digging down to their chamber.

"Hey, nap boy. Morning..." Dixie joked, waving a weak hand at him in the dimness. "Guess who's awake?"

Roy cracked an eye open and waved back. "Oh, it worked? Hi Dixie.  
Excuse me while I vent a little m---" and he choked out another bout of bad language. It faded into a soft moan when light shock finally came to give him relief.

"I think your run of trucker mouth was better, Dixie. It had more class."  
Gage chuckled as he took Roy's pulse while he worked through the increased change in pain. It began to speed up. Johnny frowned and looked at Roy's face. Cold sweat was beginning to bead on his forehead. "Roy? Are you hurt worse than your legs?"

"I think ....something's in ......my lower back. I can feel it when I breathe."  
Then he blacked out.

"Roy?" Johnny said, getting a grip on Roy's neck pulse. "Roy?! Can you hear me?"

DeSoto didn't reply.

"D*mn it!" Johnny said. He immediately reached into his partner's jacket pocket for one of the oral airways he knew Roy kept in there for rescues. He bit off its plastic wrap and used it on him. "I knew something wasn't going right with him."

Dixie started dragging herself over to the two firefighters, fighting nausea the whole way. "Dig." she said with urgency. "Let's dig a hole under him and see what it is. Maybe it's just something he's lying on."

"All right.." said Gage evenly, seriously. "But the moment you get tired,  
I want you to stop. I don't want you overexerting yourself. I'm still kicking myself for letting him do the same thing by letting him crack open that oxygen tank without checking him out first."

"We were suffocating, Johnny. Time wasn't yours to waste."

"Well, now it most definitely isn't either. Hey!!" he began to shout, picking up the ripped up board to hammer it soundly on a pitch angled wall near him. "We're right here! Hurry up! H---" Agony from his left leg locked Johnny up.

"Johnny. Quit that. Serves you right. You're a trauma victim, too, whether you want to be one or not. So shut up." Dixie ordered.

Gage smiled from the ground where he had curled up around his pinned leg. "Now I know you're getting better. You're beginning to sound more like the Dixie I know."

"Speak for yourself."

"I thought I was doing that." Johnny said, loosening up Roy's jacket and collar from around his throat. "Here, take this board. Use it to deflect some of that oxygen stream Roy's way. I want it in his face."

"Think it'll wake him up like it did me?"

"There's always hoping." Gage said sharply. Then he looked up at the dark hole above them again. "I wonder what's taking them so long to get through to us. It's not that far up to the parking lot's level from here."

In answer, a falling pipe of drinking water, the lab's two foot diameter water main, fell down over their heads, rupturing wide open. Hundreds of gallons of water began to bounce off the roof of the mangled truck and onto the three trapped below.

The water began to rise rapidly around them, filling up the hallway.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos: None.

*  
From: "patti *mimic*" Date: Fri Nov 25, 2005 4:47 pm Subject: Morpheus Effect..

Dixie let out a startled scream. "What's happening? Is this from a fire hose?"

"No, there's too much of it. I think this is from a subterranean water main!  
Don't you smell the chlorine?" said Johnny.

Dixie nodded that she could.

"Reach him, Dixie. Cover Roy's face with his air mask. He can't protect his own airway from all this water while he's unconscious like this."

Grunting, Dixie shifted on her stomach, until she got a hold of the emptied scba bottle. She began using its face plate like an umbrella , holding it over DeSoto's nose and mouth to start deflecting away the cascading water. "I got him." she coughed, shaking frigid streams from her eyes like a wet dog. The cold of it drove away the last of the nausea she was feeling and surrealistic terror took over. Oddly enough, McCall felt her brain begin to function. "Johnny. Use the water! It's softening the debris layer underneath him."

"I know. I'm already down here." he grunted, digging under Roy's hip and lower back with both muddy gloves. "I'm gonna try to free him first."

Dixie helped him with a heel of her foot. "Is he really stabbed on top of something?" she gasped, struggling to keep the air mask off of Roy's face even while the falling water tried to beat it down forcefully.

Gage didn't answer, coughing in whistling, frightened gasps while he dug a hole underneath DeSoto, using his penlight for illumination.  
The dull gleam of an opaque white cylinder revealed itself, etched with familiar horizontal black lines. It was stuck vertically down from Roy's back. "It's a 100 ml syringe of some kind. The needle's impaled him and it's partially full of something."

"Get it out!" McCall quailed.

Johnny didn't like the idea of disturbing an object inside of Roy's lower abdomen, but the thought of whatever that solution was, injecting more of itself into him, was too much to bear. Slowly, he pulled out syringe's embedded needle carefully; straight down, and back out the way it had come. One inch, two inches, three... Finally, the end of it pulled clear.  
"This looks like a bicarb needle, Dix. It's six inches long." he said, holding it up quickly into the light of his flashlight. He snapped the sharp lance's hub off and threw it away violently.

"It looks like an anesthetic." she said taking it from him to study it. "A lot like one of the preps they use before doing spinal punctures."

"I'm saving this then." Gage said, stuffing it into his turnout pocket.  
He knew it would have to be analyzed to discover what drug it contained.  
"How's he doing?"

"Still breathing. But it's very slow, shallow."

"That might be because of all this oxygen saturating the air.  
He's still pink enough."

Dixie coughed, thinking of an idea. "Give me your penlight."

Johnny handed it over, barely able to reach Dixie's hand far enough to do it.

Dixie flattened herself over Roy, using her body to shield him from the raining water burst, and ran its beam over Roy's pupils, checking each in turn without disturbing the lay of his oral airway. "They're pinpricked, nonreactive."

"So it's a narcotic working on him." Gage sighed. "It fits his symptoms.  
Let's hope he didn't get enough for an overdose or he'll lose all vital signs eventually." he said with dismay.

"All three of us might suffer that if this water gets any higher. I can feel that it's almost up to his ears already, Johnny." Dixie grunted, struggling to keep the scba mask over DeSoto's head. "We've got to hurry."

The two of them began to dig out from underneath the fallen truck even faster, shouting for help as loud as they could at the hole that was flooding them out rapidly.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos : None.

*  
From: Patti or Jeff or Cassidy Date: Sun Nov 27, 2005 7:44 pm Subject: To Dixie.. With Love..

Marco Lopez looked up from where he and Chet were washing down the sinkhole in Rampart's parking lot when a portion of it suddenly collapsed again; the fire glow that they could see, turning into more steam than their own water cover could account for. "Chet!  
Substrate's shifted! We've got a pipe burst! Get back!"

They staggered backwards in a panic as the tarred ground beneath their feet gave way before them. They both fell onto their backs and were immediately helped to their feet again by fire crews so their hose wouldn't get away from them.  
They both fumbled until they could man the nozzle again, enough to shut it off.

Running back to the new edge of the subsidence in between the parked cars, Lopez stretched himself out onto the ground,  
peering down, "Johnny?! Roy?" he shouted into his walkie talkie on the squad's band.

There was no reply. Only the sound of tons of water escaping infrastructure at high speed. He nodded to Stoker to report the change.

51's engineer spoke quickly with Battalion 14 and filled him in.

##Engine 51, is Ladder Nine setting up at your position?##

Mike looked up and saw a team from the city in yellow opening up a high tech, foam cushioned equipment case. "That's affirmative."

##Hang tight. I have a couple of Rampart's designers here with me.  
We'll work out exactly what water main's involved and try to get it shut off a.s.a.p.. Note your stable ground and get a vertical wench situated.## ordered the chief.

"10-4.." Stoker affirmed. He rapidly got what he wanted and clusters of helping hands set up the rapid access tripod and pulley over the hole.

A new voice interjected through the chatter of the firemen as they checked and rechecked their set up. "Let me through! I'm from triage. We need an update on your situation." It was Fred Hathaway. "What's happening? Why aren't your people going down there to start digging?"

Marco rose from where he crouched next to Stoker and Kelly who were threading lines into the portable winching gear and hooking up lifebelts and stokes to it. "Hey, not so close. The ground isn't safe here." Lopez cautioned holding up a damp glove.

Fred used his greater height to peer over Marco's helmet. "How bad is it?"  
the surgeon asked. "We heard the tunnel ceiling gave way."

"Mister, we're about to get your staff nurse out of there." Kelly told him.  
"We're gonna peg her position with an infrared reader and then get our team down. She's not alone. Believe me when I tell you that. Johnny and Roy, our paramedics, are simply the best in the business and they're right down there with her. "

"Wait a minute, that stuff coming out of the hole's not fire smoke. That's a water vapor cloud!" It was only then that the blonde haired surgeon smelled pipeline moisture. Fred panicked, instantly understanding that the firemen were dealing with a rapidly rising flood, and flames no longer. ::Dixie!:: Fred quailed. "Somebody, get down there now!" he said, pressing nearer. "They're drowning! Let me over there!"

Stoker grabbed his shoulders. "Doctor! Stay put!" he growled. "You're not going anywhere. Let these people do their job. Your interference isn't helping matters.." he told Fred as they grappled.

Vince Howard, manning the public traffic away from the rescue site, looked up. "Is that man causing you a problem?" he asked Kelly and Lopez from his traffic directing post.

Fred pushed away from Stoker's grip, throwing his hands up in surrender.  
"No problem officer. I was just.....leaving." said Hathaway, and he put his hands into his triage tunic's pockets. Fred strode away, weaving in between cars in the parking lot in a general direction back towards the triage hanger.

As he had hoped, the firemen's attention fell away from him and back to the rescue ongoing over the pavement collapse site. He saw a firefighter lift up some sort of camera to an eye, looking through the billowing water fog.

Hathaway immediately ducked behind a large van and made his way over to the south entrance of the lab building. As he suspected, there weren't any fire personnel over there anymore. All were at the hole, helping out with the active rescue team at the winch.

Slyly, Hathaway uptook one of the spare air bottles Gage had left at the top of the stairs and put it on. Then he took hold of the end of Johnny's safety rope that was still tied off on the underground stairway's banister and Fred began following it down into the tunnel, feeling his way by touch in the steamy darkness.

No one saw him go in.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gage was still digging around Roy's legs. It was harder, since everything was now under two and a half feet of water.

Dixie was holding Roy's head up against her chest. "Johnny! Hurry. I can't sit him up any higher." she sputtered. Rushing water was now up to her chin.  
And Roy's neck.

"I'm going as fast as I can." Gage said, taking another huge breath. He dove underwater and swam under the truck again to chop with his knife's blade once more around the plastic truck bumper still stubbornly trapping his partner's legs. He rose for another gasping breath."Keep getting his face out of the water! I've almost got him free."

Johnny's own foot, had been easy to untangle. The water had acted as a lubricant, softening his shoe's leather. Cutting it away was all that had been needed to rescue himself from the debris pile's grip. Now, he was working frantically to save Roy.

A wave of dizziness swept through Dixie and her fingers slipped on Roy's skin. His head slid off her shoulder into the water. With a cry of dismay, Dixie thrashed about with her arms, searching for him in a blind panic.

"I got him!" said a new voice.

Dixie gasped and startled when she suddenly felt strong arms supporting Roy's heavy weight. She knew immediately who it was. "Fred! Get him up! Get him up!  
He can't maintain his own airway. He's been drugged."

The doctor grunted, lifting, until Roy's nose and mouth reappeared at the surface of the water. The paramedic gasped involuntarily then, through his unconsciousness, and they watched as he started to breathe again in the rich oxygenated air.

"OhmyG*d, How'd you get down here?" Dixie said, returning DeSoto's head to her shoulder. "Are the others coming?"

"Not the way I came through." said Fred, blinking in the torrents of water raining down on them. "It's all submerged now and there's been another ceiling collapse."  
he said, slipping behind Dixie to support her back to help her with Roy's weight. "How's that head of yours?"

"Never mind that. You're very stupid to come down here after me. Johnny's gonna be p*ssed when he runs out of air down there after digging, comes up,  
and finds out about you."

"Who?"

Gage's head burst to the surface and he sucked in huge lungfuls as he shook the water out of his eyes. "I'm almost done! I think I can get him free this last try once I catch my br--" he broke off when he realized that Fred was there. "Dixie? Who's this? A survivor?! Mister, are you hurt?"

"No, I'm not. Just concentrate on your friend here. Time's wasting. Time that we just don't have." Hathaway barked. "I'm estimating another minute for him before the water gets up over his head the rest of the way. Get going!"

Gage didn't try to fathom out the odd look in Dixie's eyes, nor the one on the stranger's face. He just took another breath, and dove down again with the knife in his teeth.

Roy began bubbling and choking as the water slapped over his chin and trickled down his short airway tube. Dixie cried out. "Oh, no."

Fred was firm. "I got his shoulders, Dixie. Let him go. Concentrate on helping him by mouth to mouth. Seal him off in between breaths when you come up yourself for some. If you get dizzy, let me know and we'll switch places." the surgeon shouted."Whatever you do, keep that airway in place, it'll prevent tongue spasms."

Dixie nodded in fright and ducked under the water, starting to give Roy quick, light breaths after pinching off his nose firmly. She kept going as the water began to climb higher and higher up her arms. Dixie found that she had to pull herself down deeper and deeper each time to reach his lips and the hard plastic of the tube she was blocking off with her fingers.

Gage burst to the top again, seeing sparkles from the lack of air. He saw Roy's head had submerged completely and that he was being aided already by the two Rampart staffers. Hyperventilating by the hissing oxygen bottle's underwater bubble stream, Johnny forced himself to recharge his lungs for only a few seconds before he dove down one last time to cut free the cloth still twisted around Roy's legs.

Above him, the truck settled, sliding down with a groan of tortured metal.  
Johnny inchwormed out from under it at the last second with a fist gripping Roy's pants leg cuffs, dragging both feet out of the way.

But then a block of ceiling cement impacted him in the small of his back,  
pushing Gage face down, onto the submerged floor.

He began to struggle.

Fred saw the change. "Dixie! Johnny's in trouble. Hold this guy. I'll be right back." And he porpoised underwater after Gage.

Dixie began shouting. "Fred! .....*gasp* Fred! " But then she had to deliver Roy's next breath again and that effectively ended her screaming out Dr. Hathaway's name.

Johnny grunted as the crushing weight pressed down excruciatingly.  
He lost precious air from his lungs as he tried to get his feet under himself to get out from under it.

Then he felt a pair of hands lift it away and pull him to the water's surface. "Easy, fireman. You ok now?" asked Fred.

"Now I am. Get back to my partner, Roy. He's free. I'm climbing up onto the truck. I hear a winch line and belt coming down to us!"

Fred let Johnny go. "Ok, be careful. Try not to fall playing the hero." he teased.

Gage flashed him a grin that was only half worry then, for Roy. Soon,  
his feet disappeared through the ceiling and above the shattered waterfalling pipe.

The surgeon waded back over to McCall to cradle her as she worked to maintain DeSoto. He was now a near drowning case and not breathing on his own even though his face was easily floating on top of the water.

She told Hathaway why. "He landed on a filled needle, Fred. We don't know what was in it."

Hathway was soothing to Dixie, to calm her. "Roy's still got a pulse here. Need a break yet?"

"No.. just keep holding...........me up. I won't be able to do the same for you. I'm too weak yet." she gasped, keeping hold of Roy's chin and nose.

"Fair enough. Blow harder. It'll push what water got in,.. out of his lungs."  
Fred directed. "He's not distending, so don't worry about that."

Dixie was ever grateful for an anesthesiologist's wisdom. It felt strange being in Fred's arms again and it brought back memories and sensations that she had long since forgotten. Emotions rising to the foreground made her start to cry from stress and shock. Her breaths to Roy faltered.

"Shhh, you're doing fine." Fred told her, kissing the top of her head gently,  
shielding her from the falling water with his body. "I'll help you count.  
One, two, three...four..five.. Breathe.."

Dixie breathed.

She let Fred's voice guide her through her mental haze and fear.  
::Roy's not going to die, Johnny. I won't let him.:: she promised.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Gage got within arm's reach of Stoker. "Mike! We're here. Lower the rope farther! Roy's in trouble. He's apneic being assisted. He goes first!"

Stoker bubbled his worry ...and relief.. and started snapping orders.

Kelly, next to him, frowned as he looked at the IR imager's screen. "Johnny, we're reading four heat signatures down there. I thought it was just you two and Dixie.."

"Some triage doctor came down after us.." Gage shouted back up.

"That crazy mother---" Vince blew up. He had heard Johnny's comment.  
"I'll arrest him as soon as you fellas get his sorry butt back up here!"  
he roared.

"Gimme more slack.." Gage said, "And get this stokes outta here. There isn't the room for it! We'll go with just the belt and pulley. He's hurt his leg and a foot only."

Chet couldn't contain himself. "How's Dixie?"

"Concussed but fully conscious. She's the one breathing for Roy."

Hank was beside himself. "Oh, L*rd... Need an airway, pal?"

"No, we got one in." said, Gage, guiding the winch lowering cable down past the truck.

"That's right. That's probably one from Roy's pockets." Cap said. "I forget how much he plans ahead for things like that being an ex Viet Nam medic like he is. Stoker go grab a resuscitator. Then call a doc to get over here from triage to manage Roy as a critical. And find another paramedic team to handle our wounded. Gage isn't going to by himself. I won't allow it."

"Right. Back in two minutes." Mike dashed off.

"Cap!" said Johnny once again from the hole.

"Yeah?"

"Catch this!" Gage said. He tossed up the syringe that he had pulled out of Roy's back. "Roy got himself stuck on the stuff when the ceiling caved in.  
He got a good dose of it, enough to wipe out his breathing. A lab's gonna have to analyze it so we know how to counteract whatever drug's effecting him."

Hank caught it deftly. "Lopez.. Run. Tell the chief and then make this your top priority." he told Marco.

Marco took it one step further and radioed ahead about the syringe coming to the ER. "I'll stay with Brackett until he has an answer for Johnny. I'll have him radio on it as soon as he knows. And I'll tell Stoker to bring the rest of gear from the squad with him."

Cap nodded. "Ok, sounds like a plan. Move."

Marco needed no encouragement.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Time was standing still. The only thing that seemed to move for Dixie, was Roy's chest as she made it rise and the gushing water from the pipe that tried to beat it down again. Even sounds seemed to still.

Dimly, she heard voices. Johnny's as he slipped a lifebelt around DeSoto's waist, and Fred's as he helped the paramedic fireman ready the winch cable.

She hardly felt Gage place a belt around her own waist and she actually protested with a short cry when he snugged it tight and accidently disturbed her rhythm of breaths. She allowed them to put a fire helmet onto her head after they had Roy rope attached.

"Ok, Dixie. Let me at him. You're about to drop." Gage told McCall.

With an effort, Dixie tried to let go. Her cramped hands didn't want to fall away from Roy's face...until Fred's warm ones peeled them gently off.

Johnny leaned down and hyperventilated Roy a couple of times mouth to mouth,.. giving him enough oxygen into his system to last for the fast winch trip to come through the ceiling.

Roy's feet and knife shredded pants disappeared up into the hole and into many firefighter hands.

Fred unexpectedly, shouted. "Fireman, you go next. " the surgeon told Gage. "I'll get Dixie up. You gotta get up there for your partner's resuscitation care and to act as a go between sharing info with everybody about that syringe Roy poisoned himself on."

"I can't leave until you two do. You're crazy!" Johnny told him no nonsense.

"Yes you can. I'm a doctor and I'm giving you, as my paramedic,  
a direct order. Go. Leave here. I'll assume full responsibility."

"You can't do that."

"Sure I can. I'm not a victim of yours. I came down here of my own free will as a fellow rescuer, remember? So my doctor's authority is still acting over you most thoroughly."

"You're leaving before me. And that's that." Johnny yelled,  
thrusting the winch cable at the surgeon.

"Like you're gonna stop me, Gage?" Fred grinned. "I'm bigger than you by at least hundred pounds." Then he smiled as he cradled Dixie,  
who had started shivering violently in a sudden odd muteness. "Someone's gotta stay down here to make sure her line doesn't foul. Go,  
it'll only take a minute. I'll watch her feet as she moves through.  
She's getting shocky and I'll never forgive you if she blacks out from hypothermia due to your delaying." glared Hathaway. "I promise you I'll come down full guns on you discipline wise if you try anything to interfere with my decision here. Anything at all. So don't do it."

"Fred..."

"Don't tempt me, paramedic!" Hathway interrupted. "I will file an official reprimand if you don't go in five seconds. One,..two.  
three.."

A small whimper from Dixie and the sight of her glazing eyes decided Johnny. He reluctantly climbed the rope and uptook the one on Dixie belt. He shouted to the firemen above him. "Another victim's on the line. Take up my slack! .." He crouched briefly on top of the crushed truck's hood and met Fred's eyes with a long look of indecision and reluctance. But then he grew too busy with Dixie to remain frozen with doubt for long. He climbed up out of vision to aid in the rope guiding. "Fred, I'll be back for you in less than a minute. Be ready for my rope. Coil it twice around your belt's loop hook!"

Dixie was halfway up out of the water when the fallen truck tipped sideways and started falling towards her with a slow creeping roar.

Fred didn't hesitate as he leaped at the nurse to tuck Dixie's feet safely up into the ceiling and out of danger. He sighed with a smile when his hand fell away from her shoes as he came down again.  
::I did it. I saved her. This is more than a fair enough trade. My life for hers.  
Thank you, G*d, for letting me be there for her one last time. Goodbye, Dixie.  
All my love. Kel, you take good care of her, you hear?:: he wished.

Hathaway had a few seconds to turn then, to fully embrace the truck that was inexorably cascading its five ton weight down the debris pile, on its slow approaching way, to killing him.

Fred was still smiling when the impact forced the air out of his lungs and bore him deep under the dark frothing water.

-  
Gage startled. He was by Stoker, who was crouched intently over Roy, giving him badly needed supported breaths with the demand valve. He had heard the deep throated grind of falling weight that had belched from the hole. "Did you get him?" he demanded of the fire crews.

"We're still pulling up the slack..." admitted the fireman manning the winch.

Just then, engineers managed to shut off the water main and the flood died away into soft drops which echoed off the truck below.

Cheering, the firefighters picked up their retrieval's pace.

Inch by inch, the surgeon's rope was coiled on the wheel.

On the ground, nestled in a stokes and being blanket and oxygen tended by paramedics, Dixie saw ....the torn, frayed end of it come into view. The life belt that should have been around the surgeon's waist had been ripped clean away from the line and it was missing.  
The fibers there were red with blood.

"I've just lost the heat signature! I've lost sight of the last victim!"  
cried the camera operator, still looking through the infrared imager's viewscreen. The full meaning of what that meant shadowed painfully on Johnny's face, driving the full impact of the reality of Fred's sudden death, home to McCall.

"No!!!... Oh, G*d, no...." Dixie sobbed. "Fred...? Fred!!"

The surgeon couldn't.. and would never,.. respond to her cries.

Johnny, knelt by Dixie's stretcher, and took her hand, numbly.  
"Dixie, I'm ...so....so sorry. He left me no choice but to leave...."

Dixie's turned a shivering, tear filled gaze onto her friend and rescuer. "I knew Fred would do that. I think I knew that the moment he started arguing with you. That's why I went so numb.. I...Oh, G*d, don't blame yourself. He was ...always pushy, Johnny. And that's why I loved him so much..." she choked up, crying in gasps as her waterchilled shock began to rule her once more.

"Dixie...." "Go take care of your partner, Gage. Don't let that man's sacrifice be for nothing, ok?" snapped the paramedic working on the nurse. "Or I'll start doing some butt kicking,.. real fast."

Johnny went.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Photos : None.

*  
From: "wone3" Date: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:54 am Subject: Absolution and Grief

Johnny kept Stoker aiding Roy's breathing even as the medic team started to move Roy to triage.

Marco had made record time in getting to Dr. Brackett and getting the syringe analyzed. Fortunately for all involved, it was a benzodiazepine derivative that wouldn't pose any other side effects.

Brackett had the medication's name, Versed, radioed over to the triage team in short order and ordered incremental intravenous bolus injections of flumazenil to counteract the symptoms via I.V.

Based on the estimated dosage that Roy took into his system, Kel knew that Roy would only potentially have troubles for the next six hours or so. :: He will most likely sleep through that entire time and be fine when he wakes up.:: Dr. Brackett thought.

It was during the syringe analysis that both Marco and Dr. Brackett heard of Dr. Fred Hathaway's demise through Marco's HT.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Dixie was next moved back to the triage area. The entire triage staff felt as though the weight of the world was off their shoulders and there was a general sense of relief seeing that particular stretcher.

Joe Early saw her stokes coming and he couldn't have been more thankful to see one of his best friends still alive.

As he came up to her, he saw her red, tear filled eyes, noting her shivering body. And he could see the concussion signs that he had been radioed about before she arrived. Joe knew what had basically happened at the hole as well. "Hi, Dix. I should ask you how you are feeling emotionally but I think I have a clue at least a bit about how you feel. Fred was a special doctor and I know you cared about him quite a bit. How are you feeling physically though?"

"Hi, Joe, I have a big headache that just won't quit, and my body's cold and numb. But as far as I can tell, no broken bones or internal injuries. I was knocked unconscious for a while though." The tears came to her eyes again as she started to speak about the now dead doctor. "He pushed me out of the way of the falling truck and took the hit himself. Why, Joe, why?" she said in a sorrowful voice that had been crying seemingly nonstop.

Joe placed his hand reassuringly on her shoulder as he continued his evaluation of her. "I'm not entirely sure of the why Dixie. I do know that he came here looking for you before he went over there. I also tend to think that, even though you two broke it off between yourselves,  
that you both were still harboring feelings for each other. Am I right?"

Dixie did all that she could do between her sobbing gasps,  
and that was just to carefully nod her head. She didn't do it too much as the headache she had, still wouldn't quit.

Joe finished up with the exam and told her that she'd be spending the next day or two upstairs in the hospital. "Today will be just for the neurological checks. You'll stay tomorrow, too, so you can catch up on sleep from the checks and so we can make sure nothing else creeps up." he explained.

Dixie didn't even put up a fight, which kind of surprised Joe. But he understood with the mood that she was in after all that happened. He motioned to the two orderlies to take her inside Rampart and he told them to let admitting know that he'd fill out her paperwork once he was done triaging.

They took McCall upstairs to her room for the night, afterwards.

-  
It was several hours later.

Kel was out checking on some last minute details on a few patients before he left for the night after his absolutely nightmarish shift.

He couldn't believe that Fred Hathaway was gone. But was he was thankful that Fred had come through for Dixie.  
Just like he'd told Kel that he WOULD do.

And Kel wouldn't have had it any other way if it helped his other friends. Johnny had told Brackett most of the story of what had happened to Fred while being checked out by the doctor. Kel had known about the water and Johnny's near mishap with the truck, too. ::Johnny couldn't avoid trouble if he tried. :: he thought.

Dr. Brackett had been saving two patients for last on the rounds; partially out of the guilt trip he was experiencing and partially because he wanted to spend more time with Dixie, Johnny and Roy, who happened to be, what he considered as close friends.

Johnny and Roy he still had to thank for risking their lives saving Dixie. And as for McCall, he felt he had to apologize for getting her into that situation in the first place.

Perhaps he would add some reassurances to all during the rest of the chain of events to come.

He stopped by the nurse's desk on their floor and grabbed his patients' charts. They were only a couple of doors down from each other. Kel went to the paramedics' room first, mainly because it would be easier to deal with them and get the thank you out of the way. He was not relishing the idea of facing Dixie yet, as he wasn't sure of the words to use for both apology and reassurance.

Kel came to the partially shut door and knocked. He entered even as Gage acknowledged him with a come in call.

Roy Desoto occupied the bed still recuperating from his Versed intake and an ankle injury. Roy wasn't awake but he was sleeping peacefully, off the ventilator finally.

Kel saw that Johnny Gage had taken residence in the chair next to his partner. ::Has he been there ever since I allowed him to leave the ER:  
he asked himself mentally. ::I did tell Johnny and Captain Stanley that Johnny would have to miss the next shift after all that had happened down in the hole.:: he surmised. Johnny had put up his usual fuss but Kel knew he wouldn't get his way.

"Hi, doc. What brings you through here this time of night?" Johnny said as he slowly took in Kel's appearance. Gage could see through Kel's tired guilt ridden eyes and facial features. He realized Kel still hadn't granted himself absolution over the entire situation with Dixie yet.  
The paramedic knew that he'd have to step carefully in part of the conversation to come.

"What are you doing here, Johnny? I thought I told you to go home and get some rest. I came to check up on Roy mainly. But it looks like I also guessed correctly that you'd still be here. I hoped to talk to you both. But I can tell now that I'll have to wait until later to talk to Roy." Kel answered with both a sense of purpose and a bit of joking.

"You look like you really have something else on your mind though,  
doc." Johnny answered.

"Yes, I do have something on my mind, Johnny. I want to say what I have to say to you without being interrupted if possible, o.k.?"

Johnny nodded as Kel continued.

"I want to thank you for taking your life into your own hands, saving Dixie from the fire. I know she means a lot to both of you.  
She means a lot, to a lot of people and I am not sure what we'd do without her. Fortunately, this time we won't have to find out, thanks to you two and the rest of the firefighters who responded. And don't say you were just doing your job. Because, from what I heard is left of the lab space down there, you had to have been doing something special just to survive then. I also hope you aren't blaming yourself for Dr. Hathaway's death. He was the type of doctor that would stubbornly give up everything to save a patient and this time, ....he did." added Kel with a touch of melancholy.

Johnny decided to be blunt in responding, "We WERE just doing our jobs, but I am glad you think we did something special down there. Dixie does mean a lot to me, ..to all of us; but I think she means even more to you, doc. I'm glad none of us had to find out what life would've been like without her around. I'm just sorry that we didn't get Dr. Hathaway out in time before the truck got him. And you're right, I do feel guilty about that, but I know that I'm not G*d. Every situation is not going to be a happily ever after scenario. Doc, the fire wasn't your fault and Dixie being down there getting hurt wasn't either. Dixie was doing her job, checking on those results. It was simply her being in the wrong place at the wrong time, and yes, I do know about these things...."

Kel thought about what Johnny just said. He cracked a smile and started to chuckle. "You are right, Johnny. Especially about that part of her being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Don't stay too long. Go home and get some sleep. Your partner will be fine here."

Johnny couldn't help but get caught up in Kel's laughter, "Go talk to her, doc. She'll tell you the same thing about the fire. And she really needs you to deal with Dr. Hathaway's death I think."

Kel walked to the door and turned around, "That's where I'm headed now, Johnny. Thanks for the talk." He walked through the open door and shut it behind him. He left it as he had found it when he first entered.

-  
Kel walked down the hallway past a couple of doors to Dixie's room.

Again the door was cracked open but Kel went ahead and knocked as he entered. He could hear Dixie's quiet crying as he entered. :: I know Fred meant a bunch to you, Dix, but something must have happened down there that I don't know about. I need to tread carefully with you through this:: he thought to himself.

Dixie took in Kel's appearance through red eyes. She could see guilt hidden in his eyes and his melancholic facial features. :: I know you so well Kel. You are feeling very guilty about me having been downstairs when the fire started. :: she thought.

She saw that he had what she assumed to be her chart in his hands. And she knew that he'd start with small talk first using that before he would try to apologize. ::I'll let him start. :: she decided.

"You're doing good, Dixie. Your concussion symptoms seem to be lessening and nothing else is showing up. After another day in here and a few days at home, you should be just fine physically." he told her. ::Thank God:: he mentally added. "Dix, we need to talk. I want to start by saying.." he voiced.

Dixie interrupted in a firm tone, though not in her typical no nonsense tone, but one that still had some authority behind it. "Kel Brackett. Don't you think about starting to apologize to me. There is nothing to apologize for. And yes, I have been talking to Joe,  
Mike, a few other concerned doctors, and my nursing staff about how you have been acting since this whole thing started. You aren't G*d,  
Kel. You can't stop time just when things go wrong. You're human and you have feelings like the rest of us. There is no reason for this guilt trip you're harboring. So it's time to drop it. Right here in this room and right now. I was doing my job, just like everybody else in this hospital was doing when the fire broke out. It was just a case of my being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.... I.." She paused for a second as that last bit sunk in, realizing what she had said. She started to break down again, crying. "Gee, I sound so much like Johnny saying that. How are the guys doing by the way?"

Kel cracked a very small smile as he listened to her talk. :: I knew this would come from you, Dix. You know what to say to me to get my mind straight again. We do know each other way too well. :: "They are both doing fine. They're just a couple of doors down from you.  
Right now, Johnny is watching out for Roy for a bit, even though I told him to go home a few hours ago. Gage's going to miss one shift, though, just as a precaution. And Roy shouldn't suffer any side effects from the Versed dose that he suffered. He should be able to go home in a couple of days and he'll be back on shift most likely, within a week."  
He paused then to carefully change the subject. "Johnny told me the story of what happened down there as far as he knew it. I think there is something else going on here though. Something that maybe only you know about. Fred was a great guy. He told me that he'd get you out of there and help you and he did."

With that Dixie broke down and started sobbing even more heavily if it were possible.

Kel just held her and tried to reassure her.

She kept on crying for several minutes.

Once Dixie regained her composure, she went on. "Fred and Johnny were arguing about who should go out last. Fred ordered Johnny to go up so he could help on top with Roy and play the go between as the only information source on what had happened down below. Fred even told Johnny that he'd watch my rope for me and that he alone should be the one to do it. I went quiet at that point to make it easier for Johnny to decide. I was so scared for both of them then, Kel. I know Johnny wasn't happy, but he went. Then I was next and as I was halfway up..." The tears started to threaten to return and a lump hit her throat but she continued. "...as I was halfway up, the truck which had pinned Roy and Johnny in, started to sway and it headed right towards me. Fred pushed me up as far away from it as he could reach. Then ...I- I think he took the hit of the truck full force, Kel. He pushed me out of the way... Why, Kel?" The tears started, but not as heavily as she had cried before.

Kel tried to reassure her, "Fred and I talked about you as things were happening. We both admitted to each other that we still had feelings for you. Fred knew that I couldn't go look for you. He knew that he could, Dix, so he promised to do me that favor. He told me before he started out that he'd make sure you'd come back and I think that we both know that he would've done whatever he had to do to live up to that promise. I'm not sure what in his mind made him think that your life was more valuable than his during those last moments, but I am sure glad that he did what he did do to get you out of there. Dix, Fred needs some sort of recognition and I think a memorial service of some sort would help all of us deal with what he did for us that caused his death. What do you think of that idea?"

"I like the idea of memorial service for Fred. And I am glad to hear that the guys are going to be just fine. That certainly helps making Fred's death feel not quite as bad you know? " Dix stated softly with a yawn as she really took in his appearance. "You look so tired, Kel." she sighed.  
He DID look exhausted to her. And she knew he must have had a busy shift past the incident which had occurred at the hospital to look so haggard.  
::His guilt .. or his relief over what happened to me is just sinking in. Perhaps he's feeling a combination of both.:: she thought.

"Well, this is the end of shift for me and I'm going home to bed for some sleep, which something that you need to do, too. Your yawn has just told as much. So I'm going to bid you a good night, Dix. Try and get some sleep. Even if you're still feeling bad about all this. Hold on to the thought of how much a whole lot of people, including Fred, cared about you then." he told her with a special twinkle in his eyes as he crossed the room to the door. He opened it just enough to exit.

He heard her call out good night to him and then the small sobbing continued as he walked down the hall. He knew that she would probably cry herself to sleep but as he stopped at the desk to replace the charts, he saw that Joe had a very mild sedative prescribed for Dixie once the neurological checks were done for when she really needed help falling asleep. :: Good thinking, Joe. I guess she told you about everything, too, huh? :: He thought to himself.

Kel continued to walk down the hall after his stop at the nurse's desk and he started to make plans for the service.

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Photos : None.

From: "Champagne Scott" Date: Wed Nov 30, 2005 11:00 am Subject: Food for Thought..:)

It was a week later.

Johnny and Roy had just dropped off a sprained elbow into treatment room five into the hands of Dr. Morton when a shocking sight stopped Gage right in his tracks.  
He slapped his partner's chest to get his attention. "Look over there, Roy. Wow, I wonder who's chart that is?" he asked.

Both of them eyeballed Dr. Brackett as he staggered a bit with it until a passing orderly craftily kicked a wheelchair his way in a strong hint for him to use it to cart the thick bundle.

Dixie and Joe Early rushed from the ER's front desk to help him with it.

The two paramedics ambled into that direction.

"Hi docs. Dixie.." said Roy.

"Oh, hi fellas.." McCall greeted warmly. "So it's back to business as usual today. No more restricted duty?"

"None." Roy said. "I feel like a million bucks today."

Johnny leaned into Brackett as he centered the foldered pile in the middle of the seat so that it wouldn't slide around.  
"Private citizen's? Or firefighter's, doc?" he whispered about the massively thick chart.

Kel looked up and smiled at the question. "Neither. This is the usual adminstrative claptrap that any department head goes through whenever anyone tries to petition management to up the annual spending budget."  
"You have to go through THAT much paperwork just to get a new lab building built?"

"Yep. And that's not all I have to do. There will be a formal investigation into the final actions that Dr. Hathaway took that were against hospital protocol to safeguard such an occurrance from ever happening again in the future." said Kel. "I have to submit a personal deposition on that outlining my supervisory role that day and how I could have prevented the incident."

A pause silenced them all when Dixie sharply looked away at the unexpected mention of Fred's name. She fought back a stab of bubbling grief that made the firemen uncomfortable simply because they had witnessed her still vulnerable emotional weakness.

Johnny gave her a hug around the shoulders with an arm offered in pure companionship. He didn't have to say anything aloud to comfort her. The way she relaxed against him as she wiped away the saltiness from her eyes was all he needed to feel.

The others pretended not to see Dixie's emotional slip that had gotten out in public.

Roy changed the subject, and shammed looking relieved. "So,..all that's red tape? Whew. For a minute there, I thought you were carrying Johnny's chart to add closing notes to, Dr. Brackett."

Gage let go of Dixie, indignant at his amused, larger partner.  
"Very funny, Roy. You know, after this week, I think the size of yours is fast catching up to the size of MY patient record."

"Not quite, Johnny." said Dixie. "Roy's is still a few pounds shy of yours on tipping the scales." McCall teased.

"I win that argument. I got you beat with this one, guys." said Kel, hefting up the finance requisition forms folder that he needed to peruse in order to get construction repairs going on the new subterranean wing. "And it'll take about three hours just to skim read it all."

Gage's mouth flopped open.  
"Can't you get someone else to do that? What about your physician's assistant? Can't she do that for you enough to show you where to put all your signatures?"

"Nope." Brackett replied evenly.

"What a load of--" Gage sympathized.

"Well, it's the money that counts in the end, Johnny, not the thought." Kel nodded.

"And in Fred's case, it was the thought that counted, not the recklessness, Kel. And I'm gonna tell the board exactly how I feel so his immediate family will still get all of his life insurance benefit." said Joe.

Brackett grinned. "I'll help you on that one.  
The other good news is that no one is going to get sued for anything even remotely related to the fire. The whole thing was ruled as an accident concerning that leaking oxygen tank and responsibility for that electrical wire shorting out was found to be nobody's. It was ruled that its deterioration was just the simple effect of normal metallic aging."

Joe Early cut in. "I'm starving. Who wants to go to the cafeteria with me for a little lunch? It's time for my half."

Everyone raised their hands while the two paramedics raised their HT antennaes.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The five of them clustered around the biggest table under the ecalyptus tree and as soon as they sat down, they dove into their trays with abandon.

Nothing was said for long minutes as fries, soda and chips disappeared in rapid order.

Then McCall opened up conversation.  
"Did you know that Kel actually got down on his knees and proposed to me twice this week?" she tossed out to them, laughing.

"Really?" said Johnny, perking up at that particularly unexpected gossipy news.

"Yeah, he was helping me with my socks then when I couldn't bend over without feeling like my head was gonna pop off."

"That passed." Kel told her.

"So it did. But I can't say that I don't miss the special attention."

Roy and Johnny cleared their throats and just bit into both their burgers as they watched a full rise of red color Brackett's face.

But then, Kel surprised them all by saying. "Ok, I can fix that Dixie. You and me. Tonight. At my place for a steak dinner. And don't bring the wine. You aren't ready medically to handle metabolizing such a stuporific yet."

"Of course, Dr. Brackett. I wouldn't deviate from one of your patient care plans for all the world." Dixie giggled. Then she leaned into Roy and Johnny. "I promise to tell you how the date goes.  
Watch for the high sign when Kel's not looking tommorrow." she whispered.

"Well, I'll tell you one thing, doc." Roy said, suddenly becoming mischievous. "You aren't gonna be disappointed at the end of the evening when it's time for the big goodbye. Dixie's an absolutely fabulous kisser. And I'm speaking from experience."

"You remember me helping you?!" Dixie asked, stunned, growing pale with mortification.

Brackett purpled. "Not with all that Versed on board, he couldn't!"  
Then Kel swallowed, "Could you?" he asked the blonde paramedic.

Roy just winked at them and said nothing at all.

FIN

Episode Twenty Seven, Heavy Duty

Emergency Theater Live -  
Photos: None.

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